Super-tough coating

Super-tough coating for cellphones and discs

10:15 30 October 04

Exclusive from New Scientist Print Edition. Subscribe and get 4 free issues.


The colour LCD screens on cellphones and PDAs can get badly scratched in pockets stuffed with loose change and keys. And CDs and DVDs become unplayable in no time when children use them as indoor frisbees. Now a tough, transparent polymer coating developed by chemists in Japan is set to make scratched phone screens and scuffed discs a thing of the past.

I could use some of that stuff for the visor on my helmet. They always seem to scatch up really quickly for some reason...