An electrical twisting ball display is one of the most promising candidates for digital paper but ball behavior remains to be clarified. We carried out basic experiments into ball behavior using an enlarged scale model, with particular emphasis on the threshold for the initiation of ball rotation and the response time for ball rotation as a function of the electric field and ball size. We found that an enlarged scale model can be used to predict the threshold electric field of a practical twisting ball display. The response times of both our model and practical twisting ball display are dependent on the electric field and the radius of the ball. We also derived a motion equation that explains the experimental results well.
Tomohiro Tanikawa, Makoto Omodani, Yasusuke Takahashi, Shuichi Maeda, "Basic Characteristics of Ball Motion in a Twisting Ball Display" in Journal of Imaging Science and Technology, 2002, pp 557 - 561, https://doi.org/10.2352/J.ImagingSci.Technol.2002.46.6.art00011