Who is indestructible:-Sapphire Sapphire PK Gorilla glass screen, Gorilla glass, Corning's gorilla, iPhone6, Apple 6-IT information
Who is indestructible: Sapphire PK Gorilla glass

Summary: the Sapphire characteristics that we see is appearance, few of which have a complete and accurate understanding.

Over the past years, "Sapphire" this word appears frequently in people's eyes. Perhaps we have been "taught" to an idea Corning Gorilla glass in front of Sapphire "outdated"! According to media reports, Apple will be used in its next-generation iPhone mobile phone screen of Sapphire, Sapphire Panel of and plans to produce more than 200 million more for the upcoming iPhone6 preparation.

In addition, the media have also released demo video to show the Sapphire screen "indestructible": cut, fold, after the fall, Sapphire screen remains "intact". But all we see is the appearance, very few of us on this substance have a comprehensive and accurate understanding, but we rarely know the differences before it with Gorilla glass.

1) sapphire is love? How it is made?

First of all, Sapphire is a gem, it exists in various forms and colors in nature. Red Sapphire is commonly referred to as "Ruby", blue Sapphire is commonly processed into jewellery. However, there are also some Sapphire is transparent, so this type of Sapphire can be used on the Smartphone screen.

Sapphire-what is so special about it? Sapphire is one of the most hardest material on Earth, it's Mohs hardness is 9 (Mohs hardness values up to 10), second only to diamonds (10), which also means, and only substance like Diamond hardness can "hurt" and the Sapphire. Therefore, unless equipped with a diamond in your pocket, or mounted on the Sapphire screen cell phone in his pocket after several months of use, screen will not be affected by any scratches.

If Apple sells more than 30 million iPhone mobile phones in a single quarter, this also means that Apple requires a lot of Sapphire orders. Apple certainly will not choose their dig for sapphires, feasible way is to make artificial sapphires. Sapphire's production process is very interesting, it requires temperatures burning in the stove to 1815, let baseball size stones mixed with alumina powder.

For comparison, Corning Gorilla glass belongs to a class of tempered glass, however, Dow Corning Corporation on how to enhance the hardness of the glass, is still a mystery. As far as we know, the piece of glass into a basin of salt water, which can make the glass structure of the overall contraction, thus creating a greater hardness of Gorilla glass. This problem will arise: when we accidentally scratched cell phone screen with other hard object, cell phones if not on the ground, may split from the scratch.

2) Sapphire properties

Although Sapphire indestructible, but it essentially is a brittle material. This also means that future sapphire glass display screen when the phone fell on the floor, the screen is still likely to be broken.

Just having the data to illustrate the problem: as we all know, Mohs hardness of Sapphire value is 9, and the glass of Mohs hardness is 5, and fracture toughness of the former 2.3MPa √ m, almost 3 times the Corning Gorilla glass. In addition, if according to the elasticity and hardness, sapphire glass is superior.

What's interesting is, blue glass density than glass, which is 3., the latter for 2.54 g/cm3, which means, under the same quality, Sapphire is much smaller than the glass thickness becomes smaller.

3) costs and potential uses

Apple and other companies is an obstacle to be overcome when the Sapphire display "cost", know that sapphire glass several times the cost. Yes, compared to the Sapphire, Gorilla glass many weaknesses will be exposed, but the latter have a cost advantage, a Corning Gorilla glass cost about US $ 3 (about 18 dollars), while a Sapphire screen costs $ 25 (about 154 dollars). However, according to industry sources, currently costs are under control of the Sapphire screen at 10 dollars (about 61 dollars).

Apple has invested 700 million dollars (about 4.3 billion dollars) in the United States, building new factories, Mesa, Arizona, as Sapphire material processing plant of the future. The plant is expected to double current global production of artificial Sapphire, Sapphire touchscreen then prices will be down further and, ultimately, can be applied to our daily use of smartphones .