New Electronic Skin May Play Significant Role in Prosthetics Future

Experts claim to have made electronic skin that is a strong, flexible, and sensitive synthetic that promises a great future for prosthetics, AI, soft robotics, and personalized medicine.

This innovative invention is developed by researchers from King Abdullah University of Science and Technology in Saudi Arabia. They believe that this electronic skin could be used to monitor the health of a person and the structural condition of an airplane because it is as sensitive as the human's skin.

Although this might not be the first e-skin ever developed which replicate the human skin, the researchers said that this prototype could sense objects from up to eight inches away, react to stimuli in under one-tenth of a second, and repairs itself for over 5,000 times.

Making the right electronic skin that functions like a real human skin

KAUST postdoc and study author, Yichen Cai, said that the ideal electronic skin must mimic the natural functions of the skin, like accurately sensing temperature and touch in real-time. But he noted that it would be challenging to make suitably flexible electronics that can perform such complicated and delicate tasks while enduring the bumps of everyday life, EurekAlert! reported.

Some previous attempt of making an electronic skin has combined a sensor layer that is made from a nano-material, with a stretchy layer that will be attached to the skin. The only downside with that one is that the connection between the two layers is either too weak or too strong, which in turn reduces its durability and sensitivity that could make it more likely to break.

"The landscape of skin electronics keeps shifting at a spectacular pace," Cai said. "The emergence of 2D sensors has accelerated efforts to integrate these atomically thin, mechanically strong materials into functional, durable artificial skins."

To solve this dilemma, Cai and his team decided to use a hydrogel reinforced with silica nanoparticles to make the surface stretchable and then they combined it with a 22D titanium carbide MXene sensor using highly conductive nanowires, MailOnline reported.

Hydrogels are compatible with human skin as they are 70% made of water, Cai said. The researchers were able to make pathways to the sensor layer that remains intact even after stretching the material 28 times from its original size by pre-stretching the hydrogel and applying a layer of nanowires and controlling its release.

Prototype e-skin

The researchers were able to make a prototype electronic skin that could sense stimuli that is 20 centimeters away and respond to it in less than one-tenth of a second. Also, the prototype skin can distinguish handwriting written upon it when used as a pressure sensor.

According to the researchers, the e-skin can repair itself 5,000 times in just a quarter of a second. Co-author Dr. Jie Shen said that its durability is a striking achievement that mimics the elasticity and rapid recovery of the human skin.

They said that the e-skin could be used in monitoring biological information like blood pressure, which can be detected in the vibrations in the arteries to movements of large limbs and joints. The data gathered by the device can be shared and stored on the cloud using wireless fidelity (WIFI).

But according to group leader Vincent Tung, there is one remaining obstacle to the widespread use of the e-skin: scaling up the high-resolution sensors. However, he also said that laser-assisted additive manufacturing could help solve that dilemma.

"We envisage a future for this technology beyond biology," Cai said. "Stretchable sensor tape could one day monitor the structural health of inanimate objects, such as furniture and aircraft."

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