Apple Could Use Liquidmetal for New iPhone Antenna

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Posted August 14, 2010 at 2:22pm by iClarified

Apple could use Liquidmetal for a new iPhone antenna according to the co-inventor of the metal alloy.

Apple recently entered into an agreement with Liquidmetal Technologies for an exclusive license to use its technologies in the consumer electronics field

CultofMac interviewed Dr. Atakan Peker who said Liquidmetal might be a good solution to replace the problematic antenna in the iPhone 4.

“Let me state that this is very exciting for me,” he said. “I made the first and original alloy formulations… I am a big Mac fan and admire greatly Apple as a company. I have been using Mac exclusively my whole life, both at work and home. It is a pleasant surprise for me to see both get together.”

Notably, Liquidmetal is already used to build the antenna for the Verizon USB727 wireless modem.

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Apple Could Use Liquidmetal for New iPhone Antenna

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Sean - August 14, 2010 at 4:48pm

Umm correct me if I'm wrong but isn't liquid metal Mercury? And isn't that highly toxic if absorbed through the skin?? Not a chemist or PhD that's why I'm asking......

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Kelvn - August 14, 2010 at 7:23pm

No it is not. I have been going through this since last week. it looks like a glass but it is metal and recently apple bought this patent to use it in their stuff.

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Sean - August 14, 2010 at 11:03pm

Thanx for the input. I just assumed it was mercury. I've used molten metal but that was just to make cast molds. What metal would you compare it with strength wise? Gold being soft and pliable or steel being rigid? And with it looking like glass is it as breakable?

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Ricardo - August 16, 2010 at 10:58am

this new material is really strong and light its stronger them titanium and titanium its like 10 times stronger them iron and way much lighter them aluminum so this liquidmetal is the best out there

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David - August 14, 2010 at 4:41pm

Because this technology can be molded easily like plastic, it is ideal for a design-oriented company like Apple. The machined unibody construction of the MacBook line is relatively expensive to machine and is limited in what shapes can be reasilby routed out of the original billet. Liquidmetal could allow them to retain the appeal of a metal unibody but allow arbitrary shape. Similarly with the iPhone. It could allow Apple to preserve an external antenna (likely, a coated one) but return to a more curved shape rather than the boxier band that Apple likely chose for easy of routing out the metal.

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