Pressure Sensitive Touchscreens Coming to a DS Near You?

I couldn’t think of an “Under Pressure” pun, so just hum the song in your head while you read this and we can pretend I did.

UK researchers Peratech have apparently won the race to create a cheap and effective pressure sensitive touch screen using an electrically conductive material called a quantum tunneling composite. Quantum tunneling is what occurs when electrons are brought together on opposite sides of an insulating barrier. By doing it this way, the sensors Peratech will be using only have to be 75 micrometers thick and would be placed around the perimeter or a screen. When the touch screen bends, which can be at as little as two micrometers for these sensors to pick it up, they will detect it and react accordingly.

More importantly to us gamers, Peratech has recently signed a $1.4 million deal with Japanese manufacturer Nissha. Nissha just happens to be the company that provides screens to LG and Nintendo.

Peratech’s CEO, Philip Tyson;

“The harder you press, the faster the screen will scroll or the faster a character will run in a game”

The characters foot speed is just one of the many things that this technology will be able to control. Before Peratech blew everybody’s minds with this, pressure sensitive touchscreens were really limited to large screens with a camera behind them to detect the amount of light the screen reflects when a finger is pressed on it. This really is a huge innovation for technology. Being able to put this on a cellphone or, better yet, a gaming system will give even more control over your functions and allow more multitasking and a huge amount of gameplay possibilities. I’m just offended I wasn’t asked for permission to call it a quantum tunneling composite, since a specific part of my body has already been referred to as a quantum tunneling composite by the ladies for years now. Wait, is that good? What does quantum mean again? Instead of taking science courses in college I just took “Philosophy of Professional Wrestling” twice.

[Source: Engadget]