Stretchable, self-healing and semiconducting polymer films for electronic skin

Next-generation polymers developed in the lab must become stretchable and self-healing to form novel skin-like sensory devices to meet the demands of futuristic electronic skin applications.

Although researchers have made notable advances in skin-inspired electronic materials, it is challenging to include desired functions into an active semiconductor for improved sensing. In a new report on Science Advances, Jin Young Oh and an interdisciplinary research team in the departments of Chemical Engineering, Biomedical Research, Electrical Engineering, Materials Science and Mechanical Engineering in the U.S. and South Korea, developed a strain-sensitive, stretchable and autonomous self-healing semiconductor film.

They engineered the new material by blending a polymer semiconductor and self-healing elastomer, dynamically cross-linked using metal coordination bonds. The composite film was highly stretchable with a fracture strain greater than 1300 percent with demonstrated autonomous self-healing at room temperature. The research team then developed an integrated five-by-five stretchable active-matrix transistor sensor array (electronic skin) to detect strain distribution during surface deformation.

Read more at Phys.org

Image Credit: Science Advances

-jk-