The world is running out of a crucial component used in touch screens

Have you ever imagined your smartphone or tablet without a touch screen? This could soon be the case if we run out of indium, one of the rarest minerals on Earth.

Indium is used in many high-tech devices such as touch screens, smartphones, solar panels and smart windows, in the form of indium tin oxide. This compound is optically transparent and electrically conductive – the two crucial features required for touch screens to work.

But there is a problem: we have no guaranteed long-term supply of indium. It is naturally found only in tiny traces and is therefore impractical to mine directly. Almost all of the world’s indium comes as a byproduct of zinc mining.

Fortunately, we have a potential solution: my colleagues and I have developed a new way to make optically transparent and electrically conductive coatings without indium.

A worsening problem

Because the world’s indium supply is tied to zinc mining, its availability and price will depend on the demand for zinc.

Possible declines in zinc demand – already evident in the car manufacturing industry – along with the ever-increasing usage of smartphones and touch panels are set to exacerbate the potential shortage of indium in the future.

One option is to try and recycle indium. But recovering it from used devices is expensive…

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