19 June 2009

Nail polish colour that can be turned on and off? We have the technology

One of the things I love about nail polish is the seemingly endless variety available, not just in colour but in finish. Your've got your cremes, mattes, jellies, frosts, glitters, holos, metallics and duochromes, and now scientists at the University of California say that the future of nail polish could be polishes that can instantly and reversibly change colour. The polishes would be manufactured with microscopic polymer beads containing iron oxide particles which would change colour with the application of external magnetic fields. The magnetic field makes the particles line up in ordered arrangements and changing the field will change the order of the particles leading to different diffraction colours.

Sounds exciting no? Although the overly imaginative part of me imagines what it would be like to walk down the street with nails that are attracted to every vaguely magnetic object! Not how the science works I know, but thinking about it makes me giggle!

For more on the science behind this click here.

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