The Journal of Young Investigators: An Undergraduate, Peer-Reviewed Science Journal

30 November 2004 - Cell phone users may soon be able to create the flower of their choice by burying their cell phones. Researchers at the University of Warwick's Warwick Manufacturing Group in Coventry, UK, in conjunction with PVAXX Research & Development Ltd, have discovered a new way to make mobile telephones biodegradable and flower-growing.

Mobile phones are one of the most quickly discarded items of consumer electronics due to rapid change in technology. The Warwick team, led by Dr. Kerry Kirwan, came up with the idea to create a cell phone case or cover that can be placed in compost, where the case disintegrates and turns into a flower.

"Legislation is now coming out that requires the mobile phone manufacturers to take back their products to dispose of at the end of their lives, so our idea was that it would cost a lot of money to collect separate, segregate and dispose of the plastic parts of these mobile phones," Kirwan said on a Nov. 30 Research-TV broadcast. "By incorporating a seed and giving the consumer a reason to actually take the phone apart and dispose of it then they're able to save a lot of money and time and effort."

Two key changes in the mobile phones’ cases were made in order to make them biodegradable and flower-growing, according to Kirwan in a University of Warwick press release. First, researchers developed a special formulation of biodegradable material that produces a high quality finish for the phone case. Secondly, the engineers at the University of Warwick created a small transparent window in the cell phone cover in which they can embed a seed. The seed is visible to the phone user, but will not sprout until the phone cover is recycled.

“[the phone cover] has to have very special conditions in which to start activating the degradation process, which means that you can use it in everyday life but the minute you pop it into the ground it then bio-degrades down and goes back to the earth," Kirwan said in the broadcast.

The researchers have looked to the seed experts of in the University of Warwick's horticultural research area to identify which types of seeds would perform best in the cell phones. Dwarf sunflower seeds were used in the first prototype.

Following the success of the prototype, Kirwan’s team predicts that the cell phones may be available to consumers within the year.

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