Chemists concoct nail polish that lets clawed humans use touch screens

An undergraduate chemistry researcher has developed a nail polish formulation that will let people use their nails to tap away on touch screens.

Capacitive touchscreens use weak electrical fields across their screens that respond when an electrically conductive object, like the skin of a finger or a stylus, disrupts that field. Long nails have long been a problem for smartphone users since because fingernails don't conduct electricity. There's also a dreaded condition dubbed "zombie finger," where a person's finger simply won't work with a touchscreen, usually because it's covered with thick callouses of dead skin – think woodworkers or electric bassists.

Manasi Desai, a student at Centenary College of Louisiana, has been working to solve the problem with her research supervisor, chemistry professor Joshua Lawrence. After a good deal of trial and error, they appear to have hit on a working formulation, albeit with a few ...