Transfluxor Controlled Electroluminescent Display Panels

The Quest for “Magnalux”

“…Rajchman (1955) reported, "The picture was uniform, showed good half-tone range and high contrast" (p. 9). The frame rate was lower than anticipated (15 frames per second, as opposed to 30), but this was sufficient to provide an "adequate illusion of continuous action" (Rajchman et al, 1958(Rajchman et al, , p. 1819.…”

“…He planned to create a 1,200-element electroluminescent display with frame rates comparable to existing television sets. Working with Lo and experimental physicist, George Briggs, Rajchman spent the early months of 1955 assembling the prototype and its associated circuitry, which filled up two carts placed next to the display to maintain a thin form factor (Rajchman, 1955;Rajchman, Briggs, & Lo, 1958). Note.…”

“…with a thickness of only 3.8 cm (1.5 in. ; Rajchman, 1955;Rajchman et al, 1958). A specially configured camera supplied video signals that traveled through the drive circuitry before appearing on the screen as pale green moving images (see Figure 2).…”

“…The videotape group reached a cross-licensing agreement with Ampex, a California-based startup company, to market a magnetic tape system capable of recording both monochrome and color broadcasts (Graham, 1986). Meanwhile, Nicoll and Kazan demonstrated their prototypes to the American Roentgen Ray Society and developed standardized panel manufacturing procedures (RCA Laboratories, 1957, 1958. Even Rajchman and his team, whose transfluxor-driven display had been ignored by Sarnoff and the popular press, refined their designs.…”

“…Both of the Magnalux prototypes required significant development prior to commercialization, but the divisions, which now bore the responsibility for such work, saw no incentive to creating a successor to the CRT given the time and money committed to color television. Nicoll and Kazan might have avoided this issue with their panels, which were no longer being presented as potential television replacements, but clinical tests at the University of Pennsylvania ruled them unsuitable for clinical fluoroscopy (RCA Laboratories, 1957, 1958, 1959, 1960. Despite a partial reversal of the building block strategy by the end of the decade, RCA no longer saw electroluminescent displays as an important project (Graham, 1986).…”