IBM has announced the world's highest-resolution, flat-panel computer monitor — enabling photograph-quality imaging for business-critical tasks. The T220 has a screen that shows 12-times more detail than current monitors and makes IBM's monitors the industry's most comprehensive. It has 200 pixels an inch and more than 9 million pixels in total on its 22.2-inch screen. Applications for this technology are wide-ranging, encompassing any field that requires high resolution images -- medicine, weather forecasting, publishing, graphic design, banking, product development, satellite mapping and more. The T220 also can show several of the highest definition HDTV channels simultaneously. The new monitor is based on technology developed at IBM's Research Labs in Yorktown Heights, N.Y., and Yamato, Japan. The monitor features an active matrix liquid crystal display based on research that allowed the IBM team to use aluminum instead of molybdenum and tungsten, metals traditionally used in displays. "The T220 monitor will promote groundbreaking new applications," said Bob Artemenko, director - new market development, IBM Display Business Unit. "It enhances the exchange of all types of visual data between machine and the end user, making it possible to see levels of clarity and resolution in electronic images previously attained only in the highest resolution printed media." The new monitor will be available in limited quantities in days, with full scale production beginning in the third quarter.