Welcome to the future, where your phone can fix its own smashed screen

From self-healing phone screens to concrete that repairs itself, businesses are investing in futuristic materials. But can it curb our throwaway habits?

Smashed screens, broken circuits, water damaged keyboards - we send millions of tonnes of broken electronics to the dump every year. But what if our phones and laptops could fix themselves?

This month, it emerged that smartphone company Motorola had filed a patent for a self-healing phone display. The design includes a "shape memory polymer", which the patent application says would at least partly reverse damage when exposed to heat. In theory, at least, users could hit a "repair" button and wait for their cracked screens to mend.