Corning’s Gorilla Glass 4 Aims to Keep Your Smartphone Screen from Shattering


CorningGorillaGlass4“Please don’t be broken, I can handle a scratch, just please don’t let the screen be shattered…” If you have ever uttered this silent plea to the universe in the moments just before picking up your smartphone or tablet from the sidewalk, then you know what I’m talking about – that terrifying two seconds where you wait to see if the face of your device has been shattered or survived yet another bumbling mishap of human error. Most of us have become so dependent on our smartphones that we would be unable to remember birthdays, make it to appointments, keep in touch with our families or have any clue what was happening in the world without them, and a shattered, unreadable screen is about as stressful as losing the phone itself. Corning understands this plight, and has designed their Gorilla Glass 4 to survive even the slipperiest of butterfingers.

CorningGorillaGlass4-1The scientists at Corning examined hundreds of broken devices and found that more than 70 percent of breaks were caused by sharp contact with rough surfaces (i.e., dropping the phone or tablet onto pavement or asphalt). With this in mind, they were able to develop drop-test methods which mimicked real-world screen-shattering circumstances by dropping devices face-down from one meter (3.3 feet) in height, causing screens to come into direct contact with rough surfaces. The results of these trials helped them to create their next-generation Gorilla Glass, which they say is two times tougher than any competitive cover glass currently on the market. According to the findings gathered in the company’s test trials, Gorilla Glass 4 can survive drops an astonishing 80 percent of the time; conventional soda-lime glass will always break if dropped from the height of one meter or above. As before, the new and improved Gorilla Glass is manufactured using Corning’s trademark fusion draw process, which helps to maintain its thinness, durability and optical clarity while still improving drop performance. So what you get is a display screen that is strong, smart AND sexy.

CorningGorillaGlass4-2Since its inception in 2007, Gorilla Glass has become widely popular with smartphone manufacturers like Samsung and Apple, as well as many of the largest PC and tablet builders including HTC, LG and Microsoft. Corning says that over 40 manufacturers have designed Gorilla Glass – not Gorilla Glass 3, but all versions of Gorilla Glass - into 1,395 separate products and more than 3 billion devices total since that time. At the big reveal yesterday, Corning announced that they had already begun shipping out Gorilla Glass 4 to their partners and expected to see consumer devices using the durable new technology within the quarter.

Topics: Technology News Display Screen Technology Inventions & Innovations Smartphones & Mobile Devices Tablets

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