Thermal printing

This process is usually monochrome, but some two-color designs exist, which can print both black and an additional color (often red) by applying heat at two different temperatures.

They often use unusually-sized supplies (10CM wide rolls for the Alphacom 32 for instance) and were often used for making permanent records of information in the computer (graphics, program listings etc.

Thermal printers are commonly used in seafloor exploration and engineering geology due to their portability, speed, and ability to create continuous reels or sheets.

Typically, thermal printers found in offshore applications are used to print realtime records of side scan sonar and sub-seafloor seismic imagery.

In data processing, thermal printers are sometimes used to quickly create hard copies of continuous seismic or hydrographic records stored in digital SEG Y or XTF form.

In many hospitals in the United Kingdom, many common ultrasound sonogram devices output the results of the scan onto thermal paper.

Reports began surfacing of studies in the 2000s finding the oestrogen-related chemical bisphenol A ("BPA") mixed in with thermal (and some other) papers.

[10] However, the first versions of this process were based on the destruction by temperature of a white dye layer, under which was placed a paper pre-colored in black or other contrasting color.

A thermal printer
Bills and receipts are typically printed on thermal paper. [ 1 ]
A thermal print head
Thermal print head at high magnification
Thermal printer used in seafloor exploration
A fax machine from Panasonic with integrated answering machine, beginning of the 1990s. The thermal paper was sold in rolls which were inserted into a compartment in the device. After a completed transmission, the printed document was automatically cut off from the roll and remained in front of the machine.