Morphologically and size-uniform particles
Monodisperse particles and shape-directed self-assembly developed with the University of Pennsylvania.
Technology
Program the crystal.
Program the response.
Intelligent Material connects the physical world with the digital world. Our inert rare-earth crystals convert energy into measurable information. We engineer the crystal itself, changing how it interacts with light, energy, magnetic fields and its surrounding environment.
Real IMS crystals · TEM
The material is not the label.
The material is the technology.
The material is the technology.
The most powerful use of Intelligent Material is becoming part of the product itself. Once the crystal is inside a polymer, coating, ink, oil, fiber, biological assay or other compatible system, the product carries a persistent engineered response from the moment it is made.
We can encode information into composition, structure, wavelength response, lifetime, excitation dependence, magnetic behavior and core/shell interactions.
The result is a material that can convert energy, carry information and remain physically connected to the thing being measured, authenticated or controlled.
Uniform by design
Every crystal, the same crystal.
Intelligent Material® is grown to a recipe, not ground down from a rock. The crystals come out the same size and the same shape, batch after batch. Look closely: hundreds of them, and hardly one out of line.
- Same sizeSmall and even enough to pass an inkjet nozzle and to mix evenly into ink, plastic, thread and varnish.
- Same shapeEvery crystal answers light the same way, so a reading is repeatable.
- Same signalA recipe gives the same color and glow time every run, which is what makes it a code.
Why our crystal is different
Grown, not ground. And it shows.
Most security phosphors in the industry are made by solid-state reaction: powders baked at high heat into a hard cake, then crushed and milled. What comes out is a mix of jagged chunks, a micron and larger, no two alike. Intelligent Material® is grown crystal by crystal in solution, to a recipe, so every crystal comes out small, the same size and the same shape. Drag the line to compare.
Intelligent Material®Solid-state phosphor
How it is madeGrown in solution, to a recipeBaked, then crushed and milled
SizeFrom about 40 nm to 0.3 µm, on purposeA micron and larger
ShapeUniform, crystal after crystalJagged, broken, all different
InkjetJets through the nozzleClogs the head
In clear materialsInvisible in varnish, resin and glass-clear plasticBig enough to haze or speck
SignalSame color and glow time every batch, so it can be a codeVaries particle to particle
Partners under NDA
Six ways we engineer the response.
The crystal's response can be tuned in several independent ways. How we do it is shared with partners under NDA.
No code yet? Request NDA access from Viva Bell.
Partners under NDA
Same crystal platform. Two directions of energy flow.
The same crystal platform can convert light in either direction. Details for partners under NDA.
No code yet? Request NDA access from Viva Bell.
Partners under NDA
Four shapes. Six emitters. One antenna.
How crystal shapes, emitters and a reader antenna combine into one lock. Shared with partners under NDA.
No code yet? Request NDA access from Viva Bell.
Partners under NDA
Partner material
Layered crystals give each product family its own code. The architectures are shared with partners under NDA.
No code yet? Request NDA access from Viva Bell.
Partners under NDA
A new code for every widget.
Layered crystals give each product family its own code. The architectures are shared with partners under NDA.
No code yet? Request NDA access from Viva Bell.
Partners under NDA
One lock. It keeps growing.
Crystal recipes, timing and layers multiply into a code space that keeps growing with every product line. The code space is shared with partners under NDA.
No code yet? Request NDA access from Viva Bell.
Where the code goes
One powder. Into almost anything.
The crystals are inert, uniform and smaller than a wavelength of light, so they disperse into the materials manufacturers already use, at parts per million to thousandths of a percent. The code is made into the product, not stuck on afterwards.
Inks and coatings
Inks
The most common home for the code. The crystals are smaller than the nozzles and pigments the ink already carries.
- Thermal and piezo inkjet coding, serialization, cartons
- Continuous inkjet bottles, cans, cables, eggs
- Flexographic labels, flexible packaging
- Offset and lithographic cartons, leaflets
- Gravure long-run packaging, tobacco
- Screen glass, textiles, electronics
- Intaglio banknotes, security documents
- UV- and EB-curable fast lines, plastics
- Water- and solvent-based general packaging
- Toner laser and digital presses
- Varnish and overprint a clear layer over any print
- Conformal coating circuit boards
Masterbatch
Plastics
Compounded into masterbatch pellets, so every molded or extruded part carries the code from the first shot.
- Injection molding
- Extrusion and film
- Blow-molded bottles
- Caps and closures
- 3D-printing filament
Spun in
Fibers
Added with a spinning ingredient at about 5 ppm in the finished fiber, and readable all the way to the finished garment.
- Stretch fiber
- Polyester
- Nylon
- Nonwovens
- Yarn finishes
Melt and surface
Metal
Blended into the melt to prove origin, even after the metal comes back as scrap, or carried in coatings on the surface.
- Aluminum and alloy melts
- Powder coatings
- Anodizing seals
- Additive-manufacturing powders
Dispersed
Oil
Coated crystals disperse in oils and fuels to mark the product, or are injected to trace where fluid flows underground.
- Fuel and tax markers
- Lubricants
- Reservoir and well tracers
- Cosmetic and food-grade oils*
Bonded in
Glue
In the adhesive that seals a package, so opening it leaves a measurable trace. Surgical packaging uses about 0.001%.
- Seal and lidding adhesives
- Pressure-sensitive labels
- Hot melt
- Epoxies and potting
Not on the list?
Tell us your material.
Anything that can hold a fine, inert powder is a candidate: paper, glass, ceramics, rubber, wax, paints, even cement. We test the crystal in your own material first.
Start with a sample →*Any food, cosmetic or medical use requires its own safety and regulatory review. Loadings shown are typical examples.
Partners under NDA
Design a response with us.
Start from the signal you need and we design the crystal around it. The design bench is open to partners under NDA.
No code yet? Request NDA access from Viva Bell.
A materials lineage
From the synthesis science that transformed quantum dots to IMS uniform-crystal IP.
Christopher B. Murray is an inventor on the IMS / University of Pennsylvania uniform-crystal patent family. He was also first author, with David Norris and Moungi Bawendi, on the landmark 1993 paper describing a controlled synthesis of nearly monodisperse semiconductor nanocrystals.
The 2023 Nobel Prize in Chemistry recognized Moungi Bawendi, Louis Brus and Aleksey Yekimov for the discovery and synthesis of quantum dots. The Nobel background specifically identifies Bawendi's 1993 advance in producing high-quality quantum dots with controlled size. IMS's work applies the same broader lesson to a different materials platform: precise control of nanoscale composition, size and architecture creates precise control of material behavior.
1993 · JACS
Murray, Norris & Bawendi
Synthesis and characterization of nearly monodisperse CdE semiconductor nanocrystallites.
Read the paper · 2023 Nobel Prize context
IMS / Penn patentUS 9,181,477
Morphologically and size uniform monodisperse particles and their shape-directed self-assembly. Inventors include Howard Bell, Joshua Collins, Xingchen Ye and Christopher Bruce Murray.
Published science
Control the shape. The crystals do the rest.
Intelligent Material grew out of work with Christopher Murray's group at the University of Pennsylvania. Two peer-reviewed papers, in PNAS and Nature Chemistry, both co-authored by Joshua E. Collins of Intelligent Material Solutions, show the core idea: grow every crystal to the same size and shape, and they arrange themselves into near-perfect patterns, with no one placing them.
PNAS · 2010 · vol. 107, pp. 22430–22435Morphologically controlled synthesis of colloidal upconversion nanophosphors and their shape-directed self-assemblyX. Ye, J. E. Collins (IMS), Y. Kang, J. Chen, D. T. N. Chen, A. G. Yodh, C. B. MurrayRead the paper ↗
One recipe, four shapes.
In a single flask, the team grew upconverting crystals of sodium yttrium fluoride, the same host used in many IMS crystals, doped with ytterbium and erbium for green light or ytterbium and thulium for blue. Changing just the reaction time and the ratio of sodium to rare earth turned spheres into rods, hexagonal prisms and flat plates.
SpheresRodsPrismsPlates
133 ± 5 nmedge of the hexagonal plates: a spread of under 4%
~200 µm²single ordered domains: thousands of plates, all in step
One drop15 µL of crystals floated on liquid, then left to dry
US 9,181,477the same work underpins IMS's uniform-crystal patent family
Nature Chemistry · 2013 · vol. 5, pp. 466–473Competition of shape and interaction patchiness for self-assembling nanoplatesX. Ye, J. Chen, M. Engel, A. J. Millan, W. Li, L. Qi, G. Xing, J. E. Collins (IMS), C. R. Kagan, J. Li, S. C. Glotzer, C. B. MurrayRead the paper ↗
Drawn by IMS from the paper's findings. Plates with only shape to go on pack one way; when unlike edges attract more strongly (gold), rows flip and alternate. That alternating pattern is what the electron microscope showed, and what the computer simulations predicted.
Shape is only half the story.
The 2013 paper moved to flat rare-earth fluoride plates, from lanthanum through holmium, shaped as rhombs and stretched hexagons. Pure geometry predicts one packing. The real plates often chose another.
The reason is the coating. Each crystal wears a fringe of oleic acid, and computer models showed it grips one kind of edge almost six times harder than another: about 0.70 versus 0.12 electron-volts. Edges that are "stickier" than others, or patchy, compete with shape to decide the pattern.
Strong edge · 0.70 eV · both oxygens bind
Weak edge · 0.12 eV · one oxygen binds
La → Horare-earth fluoride plates, from lanthanum through holmium, grown as rhombs and stretched hexagons
~6×stronger grip of the coating on one kind of edge: about 0.70 vs 0.12 eV
5,000particles in a computer model that reproduced the lab's pattern, grain for grain
12 authorssynthesis chemists, simulation experts and IMS, led by the Murray group at Penn
Why it matters for Intelligent Material
Every crystal reads the sameWhen size and shape are this uniform, every particle answers the reader alike. A code read anywhere on a product gives the same answer.
Edges set the chemistryKnowing which faces hold the coating, and how tightly, is what lets crystals disperse evenly in an ink, a polymer or a fiber instead of clumping.
Shells need a perfect coreAn even two-nanometer shell can only grow on a uniform core. These syntheses are what make layered, multi-shell codes possible.
Order is information tooCrystals that line up by themselves can form patterns, alignments and arrays that add another layer to what a reader can see.
All illustrations drawn by IMS from the findings of Ye et al., PNAS 107, 22430–22435 (2010) and Ye et al., Nature Chemistry 5, 466–473 (2013). Read the papers for the original data and micrographs.
Intellectual property
Protected from crystal synthesis to information readout.
The portfolio spans uniform particles and assemblies, temporal authentication, rare-earth materials in articles and systems for identifying Intelligent Material from its engineered emission response.
Continuations: shape, conversion and assemblies
Related claims involving up- and down-converting particles, polyhedral morphology and organized superlattices.
Identity in rise and decay
Authentication using engineered temporal characteristics of the emission response.
Rare-earth materials in transaction cards
IR-blocking inks incorporating rare-earth Intelligent Material for article and transaction-card authentication.
Identification from emission response
Methods and systems for identifying Intelligent Material from changes in emission response under controlled illumination.
Give your product intelligence at the beginning.
Start with the material itself. NovaVera and IMS define the excitation, emission, timing, power-density, magnetic and structural response your application needs, then supply it in the ink, plastic, fiber or coating you already use.