Super-stretchable, skin-mountable, and ultra-soft strain sensors are presented by using carbon nanotube percolation network–silicone rubber nanocomposite thin films. The applicability of the
strain sensors as epidermal electronic systems, in which mechanical compliance like human skin and high stretchability (e > 100%) are required, has been explored. The sensitivity of the strain
In this work, we developed a conductive silver nanowire (AgNW)-PDMS composite thin film for a flexible strain sensing application. The piezoresistivity of AgNWs-PDMS nanocomposite thin film was experimentally investigated and analyzed by a computational model. The strain sensor shows a strong piezoresistivity with an average gauge factor in the ranges of 1.6 to 14 and a high stretchability up to 70 %. We found excellent agreement between our experiment and simulation results.
We developed highly stretchable, flexible and very soft conductors based on the carbon nanotubes (CNTs)-silicone rubber (Ecoflex®) nanocomposite thin films. The resistance of the CNTs-Ecoflex nanocomposite thin film was recovered to its original value under cyclic loading/unloading for strains as large as 510%. Failure strain of the CNTs-Ecoflex nanocomposite was measured to be about ~ 1380% showing its ultra-high stretchability and robustness.
In this work, we develop high flexible and compressible porous PDMS structures by using sugar cubes as templates. Force sensitive resistor (FSR) sensors were fabricated by the filtration of the CNT solution inside the porous structure of PDMS. We found that sufficient acid treatment can increase the adhesion between CNTs and PDMS. FSR sensors respond the applied pressure and compressive strains by high linearity (R2>0.97) and sensitivity (GFs>2) with a reliable manner.
Herein, we develop capacitive type strain sensors composed of the CNTs-PDMS nanocomposite thin films as electrodes and PDMS dielectric layer. The strain sensing performances of the strain sensors made of the flat and wavy structured electrodes are compared. Both types of strain sensors can measure strains up to 100%. We found that wavy structured based strain sensors possess higher sensitivity with quite stable and reliable responses due to the resistance stability and very low resistance standard deviation of the wavy structured electrodes.
Silver nanowire (Ag NW) based transparent electrodes are inherently unstable to moist and chemically reactive environment. A remarkable stability improvement of the Ag NW network film against oxidizing and sulfurizing environment by local electrodeposition of Ni along Ag NWs is reported. The optical transmittance and electrical resistance of the Ni deposited Ag NW network film can be easily controlled by adjusting the morphology and thickness of the Ni shell layer.
The demand for flexible and wearable electronic devices is increasing due to their facile interaction with human body. Flexible, stretchable and wearable sensors can be easily mounted on clothing or directly attached onto the body. Especially, highly stretchable and sensitive strain sensors are needed for the human motion detection. Here, we report highly flexible, stretchable and sensitive strain sensors based on the nanocomposite of silver nanowire (AgNW) network and PDMS elastomer in the form of the sandwich structure (i.e., AgNW thin film embedded between two layers of PDMS).
