Recent advances in wearable tactile sensors: Materials, sensing mechanisms, and device performance

The development of an electronic skin is critical to the realization of artificial intelligence that comes into direct contact with humans, and to biomedical applications such as prosthetic skin. To mimic the tactile sensing properties of natural skin, large arrays of pixel pressure sensors on a flexible and stretchable substrate are required. We demonstrate flexible, capacitive pressure sensors with unprecedented sensitivity and very short response times that can be inexpensively fabricated over large areas by microstructuring of thin films of the biocompatible elastomer polydimethylsiloxane. The pressure sensitivity of the microstructured films far surpassed that exhibited by unstructured elastomeric films of similar thickness, and is tunable by using different microstructures. The microstructured films were integrated into organic field-effect transistors as the dielectric layer, forming a new type of active sensor device with similarly excellent sensitivity and response times.

Devices made from stretchable electronic materials could be incorporated into clothing or attached directly to the body. Such materials have typically been prepared by engineering conventional rigid materials such as silicon, rather than by developing new materials. Here, we report a class of wearable and stretchable devices fabricated from thin films of aligned single-walled carbon nanotubes. When stretched, the nanotube films fracture into gaps and islands, and bundles bridging the gaps. This mechanism allows the films to act as strain sensors capable of measuring strains up to 280% (50 times more than conventional metal strain gauges), with high durability, fast response and low creep. We assembled the carbon-nanotube sensors on stockings, bandages and gloves to fabricate devices that can detect different types of human motion, including movement, typing, breathing and speech.