WEBVTT - What makes Gorilla Glass strong? 0:00:00.280 --> 0:00:02.960 Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray. 0:00:03.160 --> 0:00:08.920 It's ready. Are you get in touch with technology? With 0:00:09.039 --> 0:00:17.880 tech Stuff from how stuff works dot com. Hello again, everyone, 0:00:17.920 --> 0:00:20.040 and welcome to tech stuff. My name is Chris Poulett, 0:00:20.040 --> 0:00:22.720 and I'm an editor here at how stuff works dot Com. 0:00:22.720 --> 0:00:26.160 Sitting across from me as usually senior writer Jonathan Strickland. 0:00:26.280 --> 0:00:29.760 Since you've abandoned me, my whole life has crashed. Won't 0:00:29.760 --> 0:00:32.199 you pick the pieces up? Because it feels just like 0:00:32.240 --> 0:00:37.240 I'm walking on broken glass. One of the best music 0:00:37.360 --> 0:00:41.960 videos ever. Hugh Laurie is in that music video and 0:00:42.040 --> 0:00:44.880 John Malkovich is in that music video. I didn't realize. 0:00:44.880 --> 0:00:47.640 Oh my gosh, it's funny. Okay, Hugh Laurie. This was 0:00:47.720 --> 0:00:50.760 Hugh Laurie pre House, so back when Hugh Laurie was 0:00:50.760 --> 0:00:56.680 still known as the British comedian, not the American dramatic actor. 0:00:57.520 --> 0:01:00.640 Still British actually British dramac actor playing in a wreckon character. 0:01:02.240 --> 0:01:04.600 So anyway, yes, we were going to talk about a 0:01:04.880 --> 0:01:10.680 glass related topic today, I studied any Lenox. Oh no, yes, no, 0:01:10.760 --> 0:01:14.560 we're gonna talk about gorilla glass. That's that is correct 0:01:14.680 --> 0:01:18.320 and uh, gorilla glass for those of you who are 0:01:18.880 --> 0:01:22.920 a fan of all kinds of little electronic things, uh, 0:01:23.000 --> 0:01:27.360 has become very popular um and and some weird way 0:01:27.880 --> 0:01:30.720 a matter of some speculation in the electronics industry because 0:01:30.720 --> 0:01:34.600 a lot of people want uh there uh smartphones and 0:01:34.680 --> 0:01:38.120 tablets and whatever else that they have that uses glass 0:01:38.120 --> 0:01:41.640 and beeps um to have this glass. Yeah, it's this 0:01:41.800 --> 0:01:47.000 damage resistant glass. It is scratch resistant, it is impact resistant. Uh, 0:01:47.040 --> 0:01:51.200 it's it's very thin, it's lightweight. So it's it's this 0:01:51.280 --> 0:01:53.960 glass that provides a lot of protection but does not 0:01:54.240 --> 0:01:59.760 add uh an appreciable amount to a device's weight or thickness. 0:02:00.120 --> 0:02:04.400 So any any manufacturer that's looking to make really thin, sexy, 0:02:04.560 --> 0:02:08.000 sleek gadgets, this is the sort of stuff they look 0:02:08.040 --> 0:02:10.560 at in order so that you know, they don't sacrifice 0:02:11.480 --> 0:02:15.080 ruggedness just to get something sleeking and sexy. Because if 0:02:15.080 --> 0:02:17.600 you get a really neat gadget that has let's say 0:02:17.639 --> 0:02:22.240 a touch screen display, and you after like using it 0:02:22.280 --> 0:02:25.000 for maybe a month, you start seeing little scratches or 0:02:25.120 --> 0:02:29.000 nicks in it, that might cheese you off a little bit. 0:02:29.680 --> 0:02:33.560 Because these things don't tend to be very cheap, right, correct, 0:02:33.639 --> 0:02:37.280 So you want to have something that's resistant to damage, 0:02:37.400 --> 0:02:39.359 so that you know you're not you're not you don't 0:02:39.360 --> 0:02:41.520 feel like it's falling apart a month after you bought it. 0:02:42.480 --> 0:02:44.720 I hate it when that happens. And gorilla glass is 0:02:44.760 --> 0:02:47.400 kind of a solution to that. Now, gorilla glass is 0:02:47.480 --> 0:02:52.200 a proprietary term, is owned by its trademarked by Corning, 0:02:53.080 --> 0:02:56.679 and uh, it's a uh it's an interesting development. In fact, 0:02:56.880 --> 0:02:59.240 it's it's so odd because you don't normally hear about 0:02:59.320 --> 0:03:03.799 component of gadgets becoming famous on their own, unless it's 0:03:03.800 --> 0:03:07.160 like a microprocessor, right, yeah, I mean you think about 0:03:07.160 --> 0:03:10.400 the uh, the guts of of things we talked about. 0:03:11.240 --> 0:03:13.480 You know, things like the WE remote and all the 0:03:13.480 --> 0:03:16.760 parts in it are off the shelf pieces. But I 0:03:16.800 --> 0:03:21.120 can't really actually name any of the accelerometers or you know, 0:03:21.160 --> 0:03:23.480 the other stuff. I mean, I know they're in there, 0:03:23.480 --> 0:03:25.840 but I don't know what who makes each chip and 0:03:25.880 --> 0:03:27.400 what it is. And I'm sure there are some people 0:03:27.440 --> 0:03:29.840 that can. It's not like well, yeah, especially people make 0:03:29.880 --> 0:03:31.760 them or are obsessed with it. But let's say that 0:03:31.800 --> 0:03:34.440 you know you're picking out a smartphone. You don't necessarily 0:03:34.560 --> 0:03:39.520 know or care who made the microphone in that smartphone. Yeah, 0:03:39.560 --> 0:03:42.280 you might say, I I have my my phone has 0:03:42.280 --> 0:03:45.920 a one gigga Hurts processor in it. Really who made it? Yeah? 0:03:46.040 --> 0:03:50.040 You might. You might even know that, So microprocessors you 0:03:50.120 --> 0:03:52.400 might know. And gorilla glass has started to become that. 0:03:52.440 --> 0:03:54.440 And it's kind of interesting that gorilla glass could become 0:03:54.480 --> 0:03:57.440 like a rock star in the in the gadget world. 0:03:57.480 --> 0:04:00.560 But at the same time it is really impressed of stuff. 0:04:00.560 --> 0:04:04.440 I've actually seen some demonstrations of this glass in person, 0:04:04.520 --> 0:04:05.800 and I got to talk to some of the people 0:04:05.800 --> 0:04:08.280 who make it, and it's pretty neat. I mean, you 0:04:08.280 --> 0:04:11.480 would see a demonstration where they would take a regular 0:04:11.480 --> 0:04:14.080 glass and it was like a little sheet of glass 0:04:14.120 --> 0:04:15.760 as if you would you know, about the size that 0:04:15.800 --> 0:04:19.160 you would see on say a smartphone, all right, and 0:04:19.200 --> 0:04:21.320 they would have a little dot on the glass that 0:04:21.360 --> 0:04:23.760 would show you where to concentrate. It was like the 0:04:23.800 --> 0:04:26.360 center of the of the glass. It would be wrapped 0:04:26.440 --> 0:04:30.160 up in in plastic that's resistant to damage, and they 0:04:30.160 --> 0:04:34.640 would give people a little metal uh pointer essentially as 0:04:34.640 --> 0:04:37.640 we're like rounded at the end. And the idea kind 0:04:37.640 --> 0:04:41.760 of like a stylis for a yeah, similar to a stylist, 0:04:41.760 --> 0:04:43.919 except even more rounded than that. And the purpose for 0:04:44.000 --> 0:04:47.000 it is to apply pressure to that piece of glass 0:04:47.000 --> 0:04:48.960 to see how much pressure it takes to break the 0:04:48.960 --> 0:04:51.280 piece of glass. And over and over and over again, 0:04:51.279 --> 0:04:53.159 I saw people step up and they come up to 0:04:53.200 --> 0:04:56.240 the first piece that's the untreated glass, and you know, 0:04:56.360 --> 0:04:59.120 just without very much pressure at all, it shatters all right. 0:04:59.120 --> 0:05:01.600 The second piece of glass was treated glass, and they 0:05:01.600 --> 0:05:03.440 would press against that and they had to put a 0:05:03.440 --> 0:05:05.640 little more effort into it, but eventually it would have 0:05:05.720 --> 0:05:07.920 some cracks or it would even you know, shatter. And 0:05:07.960 --> 0:05:09.880 then they come up to the gorilla glass. And over 0:05:09.960 --> 0:05:13.400 and over I saw people putting their entire weight behind 0:05:13.520 --> 0:05:16.600 this thing, like they're constraining their weight on this tiny 0:05:16.640 --> 0:05:19.800 little point. Right the surface area is very small, so 0:05:19.839 --> 0:05:22.719 the pressure is intense, and yet the gorilla glass was 0:05:22.800 --> 0:05:25.599 standing up to that punishment. And they showed other elements 0:05:25.600 --> 0:05:28.280 as well, like a ball drop test where they would 0:05:28.400 --> 0:05:31.440 uh drop a weight onto the gorilla glass and show 0:05:31.440 --> 0:05:34.080 that it could withstand impacts. And they would do scratch 0:05:34.160 --> 0:05:37.120 tests as well, where they would take say keys and 0:05:37.240 --> 0:05:39.640 scratch it against the glass and regular glass. You know, 0:05:39.680 --> 0:05:41.919 you would see these marks and on gorilla glass it 0:05:42.000 --> 0:05:44.200 was really resisting it. So we wanted to talk a 0:05:44.279 --> 0:05:46.440 little bit about the company of Corning, and then we're 0:05:46.440 --> 0:05:49.200 going to talk about exactly, well not exactly because a 0:05:49.240 --> 0:05:52.160 lot of this information is proprietary, but generally how they 0:05:52.200 --> 0:05:56.960 go about creating glass that can withstand this sort of damage. Well, 0:05:57.160 --> 0:06:01.240 Corning is a company known for its innovation, UM, and 0:06:01.279 --> 0:06:04.520 it is certainly not a new player in the world 0:06:04.520 --> 0:06:07.760 of glass. Now Corning is uh. You know, we've we've 0:06:07.800 --> 0:06:10.120 done the history of some companies on here. We probably 0:06:10.120 --> 0:06:13.400 wouldn't do the history of Corning, but the Cording website 0:06:13.480 --> 0:06:17.240 actually goes into quite some detail. There's a really cool 0:06:17.320 --> 0:06:20.560 timeline and you look at the stuff that's happened in 0:06:20.560 --> 0:06:22.880 the company's past. I'll just touch on a few of 0:06:22.920 --> 0:06:25.680 these that I thought were relevant. UM. I mean they 0:06:25.720 --> 0:06:28.200 were they were starting in eighteen seventy nine, and this 0:06:28.279 --> 0:06:30.400 is this will give you an idea of of why 0:06:30.440 --> 0:06:33.919 the company might be interested in in innovation and creating 0:06:33.920 --> 0:06:36.880 new products. UM. Corning was one of the companies asked 0:06:36.920 --> 0:06:40.719 to come up with bulbs for Edison's light bulb in 0:06:40.800 --> 0:06:44.919 eighteen seventy nine, and eight apparently was about half of 0:06:44.920 --> 0:06:49.600 the company's business was making the bulbs for for light bulbs. UM. 0:06:49.680 --> 0:06:52.000 And you know this is really when in the early 0:06:52.000 --> 0:06:54.560 part of the twentieth century the company really got interested 0:06:54.560 --> 0:06:57.359 in and coming up with new kinds of products. The 0:06:57.440 --> 0:07:01.000 railroad industry asked Corning to come up with glass that 0:07:01.000 --> 0:07:03.880 would resist they could use for railroad lights because the 0:07:03.960 --> 0:07:07.400 railroad industry was was of such critical importance at that 0:07:07.520 --> 0:07:10.720 point in the in the United States history. Um, they 0:07:10.760 --> 0:07:15.040 needed lights that would resist breaking um. And you know 0:07:15.120 --> 0:07:18.280 due to temperature, because they were deployed in all parts 0:07:18.280 --> 0:07:20.880 of the the uh, the country and all over the world, really, 0:07:20.920 --> 0:07:23.120 I guess. And the lights need to be you know, 0:07:23.240 --> 0:07:26.400 intense so that engineers could conductors could see the lights. 0:07:26.520 --> 0:07:28.640 So that meant that with a really intense light you 0:07:28.640 --> 0:07:30.880 get a lot of heat. So the glass had to 0:07:30.920 --> 0:07:34.040 be resistant to heat. Just because of that. That that's true. 0:07:34.200 --> 0:07:38.000 That's true, and also the vibration of trains sure um 0:07:38.720 --> 0:07:45.680 and uh also jackalopes um. And in one of the 0:07:45.120 --> 0:07:48.840 h researchers at Corning, Jesse Littleton Um asked his wife 0:07:48.920 --> 0:07:52.560 to his who was named Bessie Jesse and Bessie Um 0:07:52.600 --> 0:07:54.120 he gave her a piece of glass to make a 0:07:54.160 --> 0:07:59.600 cake on UM and the the glass held up to 0:08:00.080 --> 0:08:02.480 the heat of the oven making cake on it. And 0:08:02.520 --> 0:08:07.080 two years later they released Pyrex, the glass that you see, 0:08:07.120 --> 0:08:11.760 and I have a Pirex mixing dish at home. Products. 0:08:12.360 --> 0:08:15.320 Used them in a class in school for their they're 0:08:15.320 --> 0:08:17.960 known for their lab products. I didn't realize that Pirates 0:08:18.040 --> 0:08:21.120 was actually a brand name owned by Corning UM. In 0:08:21.120 --> 0:08:24.920 the nineteen twenties UH. Corning was working on cathode ray 0:08:24.960 --> 0:08:29.200 tubes for experimental TVs and they were making regular c 0:08:29.400 --> 0:08:34.120 r T s UM. The J. Franklin Hyde came up 0:08:34.160 --> 0:08:36.680 with silicones, which are sort of a cross between glass 0:08:36.720 --> 0:08:40.240 and plastic. Again, this is kind of UH, this is 0:08:40.320 --> 0:08:42.640 kind of related, and they were. They actually ended up 0:08:43.360 --> 0:08:48.679 using related research on things like spacecraft windows and telescope 0:08:48.679 --> 0:08:53.360 mirrors and optical fiber. That's cool. UM s Donald Stookey 0:08:53.520 --> 0:08:57.440 came up with an idea UM for UH working on 0:08:57.520 --> 0:09:01.400 a project in Nineto with photosensitive glass. When the oven overheated, 0:09:01.760 --> 0:09:04.360 but the glass came out and it was milky white. 0:09:05.240 --> 0:09:07.480 And you may have some of this in your house 0:09:07.559 --> 0:09:10.480 if you have Corning where this is where this came from. 0:09:10.480 --> 0:09:13.480 He was trying an experience experiment with photosensitive glass, and 0:09:13.520 --> 0:09:15.679 it turned he realized that it wouldn't break when you 0:09:15.760 --> 0:09:19.280 dropped it. Just on personal note, boy, how do it 0:09:19.280 --> 0:09:21.440 will hurt if you drop it on your foot? But 0:09:21.559 --> 0:09:24.240 it is extremely resilient. I have my mom's old corning 0:09:24.240 --> 0:09:26.200 where that I got his hand me down stuff and 0:09:26.240 --> 0:09:30.719 it it's it's held up very well. UM and then 0:09:30.760 --> 0:09:33.720 in I mean, there's there's many more, but there's one 0:09:33.760 --> 0:09:35.679 I really wanted to talk about because it really has 0:09:35.720 --> 0:09:38.200 a lot to do with the manufacturing of guerrilla glass. 0:09:38.920 --> 0:09:42.200 Stuart Docherty and Clint Shake came up with the fusion 0:09:42.320 --> 0:09:47.480 overflow process UM. And this is a situation where molten 0:09:47.520 --> 0:09:53.880 glass overflows, uh the the um reservoir that it's in, 0:09:54.080 --> 0:09:57.320 and it pours down both sides of a tapered trough. 0:09:57.520 --> 0:09:59.880 So if you think of it's sort of like a 0:10:00.040 --> 0:10:02.240 hear drop where it's wide at the top and narrower 0:10:02.240 --> 0:10:04.800 at the bottom. The glass is flowing down both sides 0:10:05.480 --> 0:10:08.640 UM and it rejoins and fuses underneath. And they could 0:10:09.000 --> 0:10:13.720 uh this helped Corning develop liquid crystal glass substrates and 0:10:14.360 --> 0:10:18.280 is sort of related to grill inflecturing process. Yeah, we'll 0:10:18.320 --> 0:10:20.680 get into that in a minute. Um, just a couple 0:10:20.760 --> 0:10:24.240 other things. Optical fiber was a Corning invention in nineteen 0:10:24.320 --> 0:10:28.120 seventy by doctors Robert Maher, Donald Keck, and Peter Schultz. 0:10:28.160 --> 0:10:31.199 These guys are incredibly smart. Yeah, well they made it 0:10:31.240 --> 0:10:33.200 in the National Inventor's Hall of Fame and also got 0:10:33.280 --> 0:10:37.440 the National Medal of Technology. Um, catalytic converters and cars. 0:10:37.960 --> 0:10:42.000 That that honeycomb stuff is apparently glass. I didn't realize 0:10:42.040 --> 0:10:46.320 that or in at least in some cases. Um. And 0:10:46.360 --> 0:10:52.160 then uh, you talk about stem cell research. Um, they 0:10:52.240 --> 0:10:54.880 have a Corning developed a kind of glass called synthemax. 0:10:55.040 --> 0:10:57.400 Actually I think it's it's not really glass glass. It's 0:10:57.400 --> 0:11:00.400 it's a synthetic and animal free surface. Because apparent stem 0:11:00.400 --> 0:11:05.120 cells require animal they to grow animal stem cells, you 0:11:05.120 --> 0:11:09.000 have to have animal tissue, and synthomax uh basically takes 0:11:09.040 --> 0:11:11.080 that out of the equation. You can grow stem cells 0:11:11.120 --> 0:11:17.280 on synthomax, thereby preventing you from having to. Uh. So 0:11:17.400 --> 0:11:20.160 that uh, you know, that's that's pretty neat stuff. And 0:11:20.160 --> 0:11:23.040 and that's that's like science fiction stuff, is what that is. 0:11:23.280 --> 0:11:26.320 It kind of is. But you know, just obviously you've 0:11:26.320 --> 0:11:28.000 heard you've probably heard of a lot of these things, 0:11:28.000 --> 0:11:31.400 things like corning Ware and pyrex Um. I didn't realize 0:11:31.400 --> 0:11:34.720 that they had such a hand in optical fiber, which 0:11:34.760 --> 0:11:37.640 is something we've done a podcast on but not really 0:11:37.640 --> 0:11:40.440 surprising given the history of the company. But Guerrilla Glass 0:11:40.880 --> 0:11:43.679 does use some of this technology. Because we were talking 0:11:43.679 --> 0:11:46.199 about the fusion over overflow process and I guess it's 0:11:46.280 --> 0:11:48.920 we should really talk about how we make Guerrilla glass 0:11:49.040 --> 0:11:51.080 and how they make Grilla glass. Interesting, So I haven't 0:11:51.080 --> 0:11:53.000 been making a lot of it here it turns out 0:11:53.000 --> 0:11:55.640 that we don't have the robotic arms necessary for this 0:11:56.120 --> 0:11:59.520 um part. Well, first of all, let's to to kind 0:11:59.520 --> 0:12:01.600 of a step back. We'll talk about how you make 0:12:01.640 --> 0:12:07.920 glass in general, because their glasses are naturally occurring substance, right, Yeah, 0:12:07.920 --> 0:12:11.960 this isn't something chemically made in in you know, that 0:12:12.120 --> 0:12:14.560 is designed by people. This is something that you could 0:12:14.600 --> 0:12:18.400 find in nature. Nature. Yeah, anything where you know, lava flows, 0:12:18.600 --> 0:12:23.040 you can find uh glass, places where the lightning where 0:12:23.200 --> 0:12:26.600 the lightning where lightning, not the lightning, where lightning has 0:12:26.640 --> 0:12:30.520 struck the ground. You can sometimes find glass because it's 0:12:30.960 --> 0:12:36.079 essentially it's sand that's been exposed to intense heat. And 0:12:36.120 --> 0:12:39.000 it melts, and then when it cools, it's it's glass. 0:12:39.480 --> 0:12:41.920 And you know that sounds simple, but really that's what 0:12:42.080 --> 0:12:45.400 you start off with. And that's the basic, the most 0:12:45.400 --> 0:12:48.280 basic form of glass. Right. So now commercial glass is 0:12:48.280 --> 0:12:50.600 of course a little more complicated. We don't just dump 0:12:50.640 --> 0:12:52.400 a bunch of sand in and melt it down and 0:12:52.440 --> 0:12:55.520 then you get glass. It's uh, it tends to come 0:12:55.600 --> 0:12:58.360 from a you have three main sources where so you've 0:12:58.360 --> 0:13:01.760 got the sand, which is a silicon dioxide that's the 0:13:02.080 --> 0:13:07.040 chemical makeup of sand um and then you've got uh 0:13:07.080 --> 0:13:09.679 that that's the type that that Corning uses. The other 0:13:09.720 --> 0:13:14.520 two types are limestone or sodium carbonate. But Corning uses 0:13:14.559 --> 0:13:18.400 the silicon dioxide. And what they do is they combine 0:13:18.440 --> 0:13:22.280 the silicon dioxide with other chemicals before they melt it down, 0:13:22.400 --> 0:13:25.560 and the once they've added those extra chemicals in, and 0:13:25.600 --> 0:13:27.720 we don't know what all those chemicals are because this 0:13:27.800 --> 0:13:30.760 is part of the proprietary approach Corning takes. I mean, 0:13:30.760 --> 0:13:34.080 clearly they can't reveal everything because then they would lose 0:13:34.160 --> 0:13:37.439 their their advantage in the market, right correct, So this 0:13:37.520 --> 0:13:40.760 is this is secret stuff. But the secret stuff once 0:13:40.800 --> 0:13:43.880 they melt it all down. The resulting glass is called 0:13:43.880 --> 0:13:48.040 aluminose silicate, and so that essentially what that means is 0:13:48.040 --> 0:13:52.640 that the glass contains aluminum, silicon and oxygen. And uh 0:13:52.800 --> 0:13:57.000 there is one other thing that's in this glass sodium 0:13:57.120 --> 0:14:01.800 ions now, and ion in case you forgot, because we've 0:14:01.800 --> 0:14:03.920 talked about it before. But an ion is an atom 0:14:03.960 --> 0:14:06.600 that has either gained or lost an electron and thus 0:14:06.640 --> 0:14:11.560 has a net charge. Adams normally do not in their normally, 0:14:11.600 --> 0:14:13.680 in their natural state, do not have a charge because 0:14:14.000 --> 0:14:16.880 the number of electrons which have a negative charge is 0:14:16.920 --> 0:14:19.080 the same as the number of protons which have a 0:14:19.120 --> 0:14:22.240 positive charge, and the two cancel each other out. I 0:14:22.280 --> 0:14:25.040 thought a little I thought adams didn't carry a charge 0:14:25.080 --> 0:14:28.800 because they they're so small. I don't have wallets. That's 0:14:28.840 --> 0:14:32.920 also a problem, so the jokes are a problem. They 0:14:33.000 --> 0:14:36.600 use PayPal actually, so anyway, the uh So, an ion, 0:14:36.800 --> 0:14:38.520 of course, is like we said, it's one that has 0:14:38.520 --> 0:14:41.160 either too few or too many electrons compared to the 0:14:41.280 --> 0:14:44.040 natural state of the element, So it has either a 0:14:44.080 --> 0:14:46.600 positive or negative charge. Now, granted, if it has more 0:14:46.640 --> 0:14:49.080 electrons than normal has a negative charge, it has fewer 0:14:49.120 --> 0:14:52.440 electrons than normal as a positive charge, So the sodium 0:14:52.440 --> 0:14:56.240 ions are part of the structure of this glass. Now 0:14:56.600 --> 0:15:00.200 you can kind of think of this glass once it's melted, uh, 0:15:00.280 --> 0:15:03.000 and it is melted down into this V shaped trough 0:15:03.160 --> 0:15:06.800 that Chris was talking about, and actually they fill up 0:15:06.800 --> 0:15:09.360 the trough and then it starts to overflow the sides 0:15:09.440 --> 0:15:13.840 and they use robot arms. Robotic arms will pick up 0:15:13.920 --> 0:15:18.080 the edges of this very very thin material and pull 0:15:18.200 --> 0:15:21.360 them up to form sheets of glass. Right. So this 0:15:21.440 --> 0:15:24.000 is a little different from the earlier process because from 0:15:24.000 --> 0:15:27.800 what I understand that that other process actually want you 0:15:27.840 --> 0:15:31.800 actually wanted the glass to flow down the V and 0:15:32.480 --> 0:15:36.000 basically formed to lay a multi layer piece of glass. 0:15:36.000 --> 0:15:38.000 But the gorilla glass, you don't want that to happen. 0:15:38.040 --> 0:15:40.360 It's correct, Well, I think I think what happens is 0:15:40.400 --> 0:15:43.160 that's the initial part of the process. Again, this is 0:15:43.200 --> 0:15:45.800 proprietary stuff, so we don't know all the details. They 0:15:46.400 --> 0:15:49.040 obbuse skate some of this, but that you have the 0:15:49.280 --> 0:15:53.960 the glass meeting in the middle and fusing. But you 0:15:54.040 --> 0:15:56.800 just keep imagining that that trough fills and fills and 0:15:56.840 --> 0:15:59.520 fills until it reaches the top and then it starts 0:15:59.560 --> 0:16:01.480 to over flow and as it goes down the edge. 0:16:01.520 --> 0:16:04.880 These robotic arms catch the glass, the film of glass 0:16:04.920 --> 0:16:07.240 that's coming off the edge, and lifted up and then 0:16:07.280 --> 0:16:10.160 you cut it into sheets. So you've got the sheets 0:16:10.200 --> 0:16:13.600 of glass, and the glass has the aluminum, it has 0:16:13.640 --> 0:16:16.280 the silicon and oxygen and it and the sodium ions. Now, 0:16:16.400 --> 0:16:18.840 think of the glass as kind of like you know, 0:16:18.920 --> 0:16:23.800 we're talking about this sort of structure of of these elements. 0:16:23.840 --> 0:16:27.640 Think of it like a net. All right. So the aluminum, 0:16:27.640 --> 0:16:30.480 the silicon, and the auction are forming the rope that 0:16:30.520 --> 0:16:32.560 you would have in a net. So you've got this 0:16:32.640 --> 0:16:36.200 rope net. Now in the holes of that net are 0:16:36.320 --> 0:16:40.520 these sodium ions, al right, and that that gives the 0:16:40.560 --> 0:16:44.160 net a little stiffness. Alright, it's a little it's a 0:16:44.200 --> 0:16:46.280 little uh, it's not as flexible as it would be 0:16:46.320 --> 0:16:50.440 without the sodium. Then you say, well, how do we 0:16:50.480 --> 0:16:53.160 make this stronger? Well, what they do is they dip 0:16:53.320 --> 0:16:57.280 these sheets into a molten salt bath. And what they're 0:16:57.360 --> 0:17:01.840 using is potassium and the potass sum ions. So you've 0:17:01.840 --> 0:17:04.920 got potassium ions in this salt bath. The potassium ions 0:17:04.920 --> 0:17:08.720 actually replace the sodium ions. Now I want all of 0:17:08.760 --> 0:17:12.439 you to take out your periodic table of elements so everyone, 0:17:12.480 --> 0:17:16.199 get out your periodic table. Well wait, all right, So 0:17:16.200 --> 0:17:18.520 if you're looking at your periodic table and you try 0:17:18.520 --> 0:17:20.920 and find sodium on there, I'll I'll give you a hint. 0:17:21.000 --> 0:17:23.560 It's on the left side. Uh. You look at that 0:17:23.640 --> 0:17:26.440 first column. You see that sodium is there, and it's 0:17:26.600 --> 0:17:32.320 directly above potassium. So here's the way the elemental table 0:17:32.480 --> 0:17:34.440 is arranged that Chris has his out, I've got my 0:17:34.560 --> 0:17:38.200 not already here, um, but it's arranged so that the 0:17:38.200 --> 0:17:41.400 the when you look at a vertical stack of elements, 0:17:41.720 --> 0:17:47.040 those elements share similar properties. This isn't just arranged by 0:17:47.040 --> 0:17:52.399 weight or willy nilly. The vertical stacks symbolize elements that 0:17:52.440 --> 0:17:56.520 share very similar features. Chris is trying to distract me 0:17:56.520 --> 0:18:01.239 with animation now with his iPad. Stop it anyway. So 0:18:01.320 --> 0:18:04.560 you've got sodium directly above potassium. That means that sodium 0:18:04.600 --> 0:18:07.639 and potassium share a lot of the same qualities, but 0:18:08.200 --> 0:18:11.679 sodium is lighter than potassium. Potassium is a larger element, 0:18:11.760 --> 0:18:14.960 so it's got larger atoms that make that's important because 0:18:14.960 --> 0:18:18.000 what happens is when the potassium replaces the sodium in 0:18:18.000 --> 0:18:23.080 this salt bath, the potassium atoms are actually larger, and 0:18:23.280 --> 0:18:25.800 they make that you know, they take up more space 0:18:25.880 --> 0:18:28.080 in those holes in the net. It actually makes the 0:18:28.160 --> 0:18:33.400 material stiffer and more resistant to damage. UM. And that's 0:18:33.480 --> 0:18:35.960 it's pretty interesting stuff. And the reason why this works 0:18:36.480 --> 0:18:40.200 is because the energy you need to break a molecular bond, 0:18:40.400 --> 0:18:43.520 or an ionic bond in this case. UH, the energy 0:18:43.560 --> 0:18:46.280 you need to break an ionic bond varies depending upon 0:18:46.720 --> 0:18:50.040 the size of the atom. You need more energy to 0:18:50.160 --> 0:18:54.160 break the ionic bond for potassium than you do for sodium. 0:18:54.240 --> 0:18:57.399 So if you heat up that bath at just the 0:18:57.480 --> 0:19:02.720 right temperature and you dip a material like this glass 0:19:02.920 --> 0:19:05.440 that has sodium ions in it, that heat is going 0:19:05.440 --> 0:19:07.720 to be strong enough to break that ionic bond and 0:19:07.720 --> 0:19:12.440 the sodium ions will will part from the structure. UH. 0:19:12.720 --> 0:19:14.320 Now you have to make sure that the heat is 0:19:14.359 --> 0:19:16.280 not too high, because if it's too high, one of 0:19:16.359 --> 0:19:19.560 two things could happen. You would prevent the potassium ions 0:19:19.600 --> 0:19:23.000 from bonding because the energy would be too great for 0:19:23.080 --> 0:19:25.879 them to form an ionic bond. Or you would actually 0:19:25.880 --> 0:19:28.919 reach the melting point of the glass itself and the 0:19:28.960 --> 0:19:31.159 glass would melt into the bath and you wouldn't have 0:19:31.200 --> 0:19:34.439 anything to show for it. That that seems like it 0:19:34.440 --> 0:19:37.080 would be counterproductive yet, right, so you have to find 0:19:37.160 --> 0:19:40.159 just the right temperature and uh, and that's kind of 0:19:40.160 --> 0:19:43.919 what Corning has done. Dy've they've arranged it. So I 0:19:43.960 --> 0:19:46.600 think it's around oh four degrees celsius, which is about 0:19:46.600 --> 0:19:49.719 seven fifty two degrees fahrenheit for this salt bath. More 0:19:49.800 --> 0:19:53.880 or less, it's it's it's toasty so or molten as 0:19:53.880 --> 0:19:58.080 we often say. So the you've got the sodium ions, 0:19:58.119 --> 0:20:00.200 they go away, the potassium ions take their play ace. 0:20:00.680 --> 0:20:04.320 This makes the entire structure much more uh, stiff and 0:20:04.359 --> 0:20:08.360 resistant to damage. You then withdraw the the glass very 0:20:08.400 --> 0:20:10.960 carefully from the molten bath and you let it dry 0:20:11.000 --> 0:20:15.320 and cool and um, and then you've got this compressed material. 0:20:15.400 --> 0:20:18.480 It's and it's compressed because those potassium ions are larger 0:20:18.480 --> 0:20:22.320 than the sodium ions. Um. And just in case you're curious, 0:20:22.359 --> 0:20:25.119 sodium and potassium both belonged to a group of elements 0:20:25.160 --> 0:20:28.919 called active metals, and active metals are are materials that 0:20:28.960 --> 0:20:34.560 react very strongly with with other substances. So that's that's 0:20:34.600 --> 0:20:38.240 the secret, right, that's exactly the well, again, not exactly, 0:20:38.240 --> 0:20:41.120 but that's the general process that Corning uses in order 0:20:41.160 --> 0:20:44.240 to chemically strengthened glass. And there are other there are 0:20:44.280 --> 0:20:47.800 other processes out there that are similar. But like when 0:20:47.800 --> 0:20:50.520 I was talking about the demonstration where you had the 0:20:50.520 --> 0:20:53.360 the regular glass, the treated glass, and the gorilla glass, 0:20:53.600 --> 0:20:56.720 the treated glass is glass that's been has gone through 0:20:56.800 --> 0:20:59.399 at least a similar process, but doesn't have all the 0:20:59.480 --> 0:21:03.440 little ements that the corning uses to guarantee a very 0:21:03.480 --> 0:21:07.359 strong compressed material. Yeah. I think a lot of us 0:21:07.400 --> 0:21:12.520 who who own portable electronics that have a glass front 0:21:12.600 --> 0:21:16.080 on it, um probably at least at one point said, 0:21:16.760 --> 0:21:20.520 you know to ourselves, man, glass, that's that's gonna be difficult. 0:21:20.560 --> 0:21:23.320 And then you start looking at things like, um, uh, 0:21:23.359 --> 0:21:25.840 you know that now that we have the two sided phones, 0:21:26.520 --> 0:21:29.480 you know we have glass on more than one side 0:21:29.480 --> 0:21:31.399 of the device. And you're starting to go, yeah, this 0:21:31.440 --> 0:21:33.479 is great, but I dropped my phone a lot, or 0:21:33.480 --> 0:21:34.920 you know, how am I gonna How am I gonna 0:21:34.920 --> 0:21:36.959 prevent this thing from I might put in my pocket 0:21:36.960 --> 0:21:39.080 where my keys are? Yeah, and I have done that. 0:21:39.200 --> 0:21:42.119 I've well, I've done that and and had uh my 0:21:42.200 --> 0:21:44.760 phone gets scratched up on the non glass surfaces, and 0:21:44.800 --> 0:21:49.160 you think glass, well, it's doomed. Man, Um, why don't 0:21:49.160 --> 0:21:51.640 they just use plastic? Well, of course, glass is going 0:21:51.680 --> 0:21:56.080 to make the display uh so much more vivid. Um, 0:21:56.119 --> 0:21:59.120 it's a it's a better material to use. Uh. So 0:21:59.440 --> 0:22:03.440 it's it's really impressive that uh there is a material 0:22:03.480 --> 0:22:05.480 that that works so well for that. Of course, Uh 0:22:05.480 --> 0:22:08.680 you know, other manufacturers have their own, as you pointed out, 0:22:08.680 --> 0:22:14.160 and other, um proprietary methods for using glass. Um. But yeah, 0:22:14.160 --> 0:22:16.000 I mean this is not something that you go by 0:22:16.080 --> 0:22:18.600 yourself and add to you know, you you can't go 0:22:18.680 --> 0:22:21.359 get a piece of grilla glass from Corning and say, 0:22:21.760 --> 0:22:24.800