Smartphone Bacteria

If you're a squeamish clean freak, then you may feel like not using your smartphone after reading this. It may look sleek and shiny, but your smartphone is actually crawling with bacteria and germs. While some of these bacteria may be harmless, some can actually be harmful to your body. 

A professor from the University of Surrey, Dr Simon Park, had his students imprint their smartphones onto petri dishes which can aid bacteria growth. They then let the bacteria grow for a few days. Here, most of the bacterial growth is clustered at the top and bottom of the smartphone. The petri dishes were blooming with various kinds of bacteria and fungi afterwards. You can trace the shape of the smartphone via the outline of the bacteria. 

According to Dr Park, such bacteria is also a record of your personal and cleanliness habits. "It harbors a history of our personal and physical contacts such as other people, soil," he wrote on his blog. Some even bring their smartphone to the washroom, which enhances growth of coliforms, when they place their smartphones on the various surfaces of the washroom!

To clean your smartphone properly, first switch off the phone completely or remove the battery. Then use special screen cleaners and a dry cloth to wipe down the phone. If you don't want to spend so much on cleaners, you can use a diluted mix of water and alcohol. 

Whatever it is, do not dunk the entire phone into water. You can also use sticky tape to remove all the grit and dust stuck between keypads or in tiny nooks and crannies. Wait for the phone to dry entirely before switching it on, or inserting the battery back in.