Android Skin
A Korean research team has succeeded in developing a tech to make artificial electronic skin that can detect temperature, humidity, and smell.
On July 16, a research team at the Center for Advanced Soft Electronics successfully developed a technology to make electronic skin capable of detecting different kinds of harmful gases and organic solvents, which human skin cannot do.
The e-skin was made using the property of electrical capacity, an ability of objects to store electricity. After synthesizing a carbon nanotube fiber with high electrical conductivity and elasticity, the research team made a wearable piezoelectric element using the synthesized material. The element is flexible and stretchable like human skin, and it is tactile and olfactory, unlike existing tactile-oriented e-skin. The newly-developed e-skin is expected to be widely used to make wearable medical devices, sensory displays, and multi-functional robot skin.
“In the past, very complex nanomaterials and structures were used, and different materials were used for tactile and olfactory functions. So, output signals were inevitably mixed,” explained Kim Do-hwan, professor of the Department of Organic Materials and Fiber Engineering at Soongsil University. He added, “But the newly-developed e-skin has a very simple structure. So, I think that it will be possible to make flexible products at ultra-low cost.”
The study was funded by Korea’s Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning under the Global Frontier Project, and it is going to be featured as a cover article in the upcoming issue of Advanced Materials, a weekly scientific journal covering materials science.