LED was used in the gigantic "scroll" at the opening ceremony of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games exhibiting ancient Chinese culture. That scroll was very costly, according to Shuai, but OLED on plastics would have been much cheaper.

Compared with liquid crystal display (LCD), OLED is much more energy efficient, space efficient and produces a clearer picture, because it does not need back light.

The versatility of OLED means it's possible that in the near future we will be able to roll up our television or computer screens onto a scroll and put them in a drawer, or even wear them on our clothes.

OLED could also be coated onto soldiers' uniforms to enable them to blend into their environment like chameleons.

"I will carry my research on OLED to new depths. The field has bright prospects and it will take more than a lifetime to complete research into it," said Shuai.

Shuai was elected a member of the International Academy of Quantum Molecular Science (IAQMS) this July, at the 45th member meeting. Aged 46, he is the youngest member and also the second Chinese member ever elected into the academy.

The International Academy of Quantum Molecular Science (IAQMS) is an international scientific society created in Menton, France in 1967.

The members are "chosen from among the scientists of all countries who have distinguished themselves by the value of their scientific work and their role as a pioneer or leader of a school in the broad field of quatum chemistry," according to the IAQMS. Among the members of IAQMS, 11 are Nobel laureates.

Shuai was selected because of his original research in theoretical chemistry, including prediction of molecular luminescence quantum efficiency, electron transfer and nonlinear optical absorption.

Shuai was born in Jiangxi Province of China in 1962. After obtaining his Ph.D. degree from Fudan University in Shanghai, he did postdoctoral research in the Laboratory of Chemistry for Novel Materials of Mons-Hainaut University in Belgium. He did research in Belgium for a decade until he returned to China to work for the Chinese Academy of Sciences in 2002.