Electronics, they’re at the center of almost everything we use and interact with on a daily basis and also one of the biggest sources of frustration known to man. But what if, when a gadget or appliance broke, it could repair itself, and do it so fast that you wouldn’t notice? That’s happening, right now.

A team of University of Illinois engineers has developed a “self-healing” system that is capable of restoring connectivity to a cracked circuit in less time than it takes you to notice the problem at all.

“It simplifies the system,” said chemistry professor Jeffrey Moore… “Rather than having to build in redundancies or to build in a sensory diagnostics system, this material is designed to take of the problem itself.”

Although the system itself is the product of intense, complicated research, the concept is simple enough. Electronic circuits are coated with tiny microcapsules which contains liquid metal, when a crack forms the capsule(s) crack open and fill the resulting gap, instantly restoring connectivity.

In a world where electronic devices are becoming ever more complicated, a single fault could disrupt the entire system. While losing the use of your mp3-player for a day or two might not be the worst thing that could ever happen to you, having your car’s “brain” crash mid-drive could be and this new system could be instrumental in bringing about change. Because the system is completely automous, it can take care of problems you might never have found yourself. One of the researchers uses the electronics within an aircraft as an example,

“In an aircraft, especially a defense-based aircraft, there are miles and miles of conductive wire. You don’t often know where the break occurs. The automous part is nice – it knows where it broke, even if we don’t.”

Considering that often the cost of repairing electronics is not much less than replacing the device itself, this system has the potential to really shake things up in the consumer market, not to mention the impact it could have on the commercial industry. Here’s to hoping it makes it out of the lab.

[Source: News Bureau Illinois]