Gregory P. Crawford, the William K. Warren Foundation Dean of the College of Science, will teach a daylong workshop on Friday, Jan. 16 to new patent examiners at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in Alexandria, Va.. Crawford, who became dean in July, is an expert on soft matter materials. His research focus has been on liquid crystals, used in the most prominent display technology in the marketplace.
Patent reviewers are receiving a rapidly increasing number of applications in the booming field of display technology. Crawford’s course covers liquid crystal physics and chemistry, liquid crystal materials and how to model them, and the technology behind the liquid crystal display, such as electrical addressing, multiplexing, and the fundamental optics of display operation. It also covers other materials and devices, including plasma, electroluminescence, electrophoretics, MEMS, and technologies involved in applications from large flat-panel TVs to the industry dream of eventually creating electronic paper.
Crawford, a fellow of the Society for Information Display, holds 15 U.S. patents. He has been published more than 200 times in basic and applied research publications, review articles and book chapters. His research on liquid crystal and polymer materials has important implications for photonics, nanoscience and technology and biomedical devices as well as displays. The work has led to the foundation of two startup companies, Myomics, Inc. and Corum Medical.
