LCARS & Finger Grease?

[Ensign Ricky]

So what does LCARS do with finger grease? Is there self-cleaning tech at play, or does the janitor clean the screens during the night shift? I can't use my iPad without turning it into a deep-fryer. Same goes for other bodily fluids.

 

[Kor]

Humans in the 24th century no longer succumb to finger grease. They have a more evolved sensibility.

Kor

 

[Balok's Decoy]

Movie magic?

 

[Ithekro]

Replicated foods have removed that from the diet?

 

[David cgc]

I'd imagine they have a more advanced version of the oil-repelling coating on modern smart-phone glass that lets you easily wipe off fingerprints with any dry cloth. On Star Trek, fingerprints probably just slide off glass, or the oil is repelled so much it doesn't transfer from the skin.

 

[Tenacity]

LCARS and padds and even communicator insignias are actually powered by finger (and elbow) grease.

 

[Ar-Pharazon]

Humans in the 24th century no longer succumb to finger grease. They have a more evolved sensibility.

Kor

So 24th century humans suffer from dry skin?

 

[DeepSpaceYorks]

There is an episode of TNG where Data slams his hands into his navigation touchscreen and leaves a huge smear of grease behind. It's only really noticeable now it's been remastered. Perhaps he had an oil leak?

 

[Space Coast]

Very very thin, flexible, transparent gloves.

 

[Ronald Held]

Combination of highly repellant displays and specialized bacteria that take in the oils?

 

[Space Coast]

Combination of highly repellant displays and specialized bacteria that take in the oils?

Bacteria would be unnecessary and probably a very Bad Thing, not to mention hideously expensive to develop a strain that won't cause a pandemic in any Federation species.

 

[Idran]

Bacteria would be unnecessary and probably a very Bad Thing, not to mention hideously expensive to develop a strain that won't cause a pandemic in any Federation species.

Yeah, this seems like an easy enough problem to solve chemically and physically by the 24th century, a biological solution seems like unnecessary overkill.

 

[Ronald Held]

I did not invent the bio solution. Older novels had specialized bacteria taking in dead cells and other organic matter and converting it.

 

[Go-Captain]

Even today, some devices come with an oleophobic coating. The problem is it wears off very quickly. It is easy to imagine a perfected coating, or a material which is naturally oleophobic by the 24th century.

 

[Captain Rob]

It's the same rule you use for the gym.
When you're done using the equipment. Please wipe it down for the next person.

 

[TommyR01D]

To view this content we will need your consent to set third party cookies.
For more detailed information, see our cookies page.

Accept third party cookies

 

[flandry84]

Never mind the finger grease....it's the beeping.Constant,unending beeping!

 

[Timo]

Whatever it is, it's both consistent and plausible.

1) Surely the 24th century would have come up with a means to remove stains from flat surfaces, and others. There's both a demand and no doubt an abundance of means.
2) Indeed, we hear this has happened: Riker says the ship cleans itself.
3) And we see this happen, and hints at how it happens: stains of all sort appear, but then change shape, and ultimately disappear.

Trained bacteria sound like a realistic solution from today's vantage point. But 24th century is way beyond realism and entitled to other solutions - just like the real 20th century was way beyond realism from preceding vantage points, and entitled to solving ages-old problems of communications, computation, commuting or combat with all sorts of apparent dark magic.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[flandry84]

Or a type of electro- static field that prevents build up of bio and non-bio material on the surfaces of the ship. A non harmful,non-noticeable version of a baryon sweep.

 

[2takesfrakes]

T0S & the early T0S movie bridge buttons make more sense to me, because it's like ... you can't always look at the console, whilst you're typing shite. With LCARS everything you type seems the same, there's no real way to differentiate one "key" from another. Though, I must confess to never having given any thought to finger-grease, before ...