Flexible electronic skin facilitates human-machine interactions

Human skin contains sensitive nerve cells that detect pressure, temperature and other sensations allowing tactile interactions with the environment. To help robots and prostheses reach these capabilities, scientists are trying to develop electronic skins. Researchers are now reporting a new method in ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces that creates an ultrathin and extensible electronic skin that could be used for various human-machine interactions. See a video of the electronic skin here.

Electronic skin could be used in many applications, including prosthetics, portable health monitors, robotics and virtual reality. A major challenge is to transfer ultra-thin electrical circuits to complex 3D surfaces and then to ensure that the electronic components are sufficiently flexible and expandable to allow movement. Some scientists have developed flexible "electronic tattoos" for this purpose, but their production is generally slow, expensive and requires cleanroom manufacturing methods such as photolithography. Mahmoud Tavakoli, Carmel Majidi and his colleagues wanted to develop a fast, simple and inexpensive method for the production of thin-film circuits with integrated microelectronics.

In the new approach, the researchers modeled a circuit template on a sheet of transfer tattoo paper with an ordinary office laser printer. They then coated the template with a silver paste glued only to the printed toner ink. In addition to the silver paste, the team has deposited a liquid metal alloy based on gallium and indium that increases the electrical conductivity and flexibility of the circuit. Finally, they added external electronic components, such as microchips, with a conductive "glue" consisting of vertically aligned magnetic particles embedded in a polyvinyl alcohol gel. The researchers transferred the electronic tattoo to various objects and demonstrated several applications of the new method, such as the control of a robot prosthetic arm, monitoring the activity of human skeletal muscle and the ability of the human body. integration of proximity sensors in the 3D model of a hand.

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