Discovered by accident!
Researchers at the University of Tokyo have developed a type of glass that can repair themselves. The work was described in the Science magazine Science and could potentially mean the end of cracked mobile screens, writes The Guardian.
The special glass is made of a polymeric material with the property that it can "melt" again after splitting up to form a new hard surface. All you have to do is expose the fabric for manual compression with your hands for half a minute.
However, the new drug that the Japanese scientists made works in the usual room temperature, which makes it much more useful, and in addition, according to researchers, a high degree of mechanical robustness is expected.
Artificially, the interesting properties of the drug were discovered by a student by accident. The fabric was actually meant to act as an adhesive, but the student discovered that the material's material reconnected after being cut in two and that the drug restored the original hardness after only a few hours.
Yet, it is still a highly experimental concept, and there is probably a long way left for a possible commercialization. Meanwhile, advances are also made in "unbreakable" display technology, and there will be many more discoveries in the future!
