A team of American and British designers have developed an interactive mobile device in a reconfigurable form for touchscreen displays.

Dubbed as Cubimorph, it is a prototype interactive mobile device that has OLED touchscreens on each of its six faces and uses a hinge-mounted turntable mechanism to self-reconfigure in the user's hand. Not only could the Cubimorph change itself into any shape, it could select the best morphing route algorithmically, avoiding a cumbersome configuration like a straight line, or one that risks trapping its user's fingers.

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The reconfiguration process is automatic because of the motorized turntables, which receive instructions from a computer running algorithms to determine how best to configure the faces based on what the user wants to do. The idea behind the morphable prototype is to create what its designers call “programmable matter.” It is also similar to 3D printing where users shape their existing device into a form factor that can accomplish the task.

The Cubimorph is the work of Dr. Anne Roudaut from the University of Bristol's Computer Science department, created in collaboration with academics from Purdue, Sussex and Lancaster universities.

“Cubimorph is the first step towards a real modular interactive device. Much work still needs to be achieved to put such devices in the end-user hands but we hope our work will create discussion between the human computer interaction and robotics communities that could be of benefit to one another,” Roudaut said in a statement.

Cubimorph is not a real phone yet, the team is displaying a series of mechanical prototypes showing how the concept could enable smartphones that can be reconfigured on the fly.

The team will officially present their Cubimorph prototype at the International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) 2016 conference in Stockholm, Sweden.

TagsRubix Cube, Cubimorph, touchscreen display, shapeshifting phone, mobile prototype