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Flexible and wearable BaTiO3/polyacrylonitrile-based piezoelectric sensor for human posture monitoring

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Abstract

Tactile sensors are essential components of wearable electronic devices, but there are still various problems in terms of energy supply, flexibility and skin adaptability. In this paper, we report a self-powered flexible tactile sensor (FTS) mainly composed of a BaTiO3/polyacrylonitrile/Ecoflex (BTO/PAN/Ecoflex) composite film, which can be used for dynamically monitoring human plantar pressure, posture and other physiological and motion parameters. Combining the synergistic piezoelectric properties of PAN and BTO, the output voltage/current of the BTO/PAN/Ecoflex composite film is 4.5/5.8 times that of the BTO/Ecoflex composite film, with maximum instantaneous power that can reach up to 3.375 µW. Under the action of external pressure stress, the FTS can reach a normalized voltage sensitivity and voltage linearity of 0.54 V/N and 0.98, respectively. Furthermore, a human-machine interaction test system is built, which can display the stress changes of human body monitoring parts in real time according to voltage changes and different color assignments. The developed human-machine interaction test system provides a new idea for the diagnosis of flatfoot and other medical diseases. Hence, this work proposes new FTSs that use a BTO/PAN/Ecoflex composite film with high sensitivity and great output performance, thus exhibiting immense potential application prospects in medical research, personalized recognition and human-machine interaction.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Science and Technology on Electronic Test and Measurement Laboratory, North University of China, Taiyuan, 030051, China

    JiLiang Mu, Shuai Xian, JunBin Yu, ZhengYang Li, JuanHong Zhao, JiXin Zhong, XiaoTao Han, XiaoJuan Hou, Jian He & XiuJian Chou

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  1. JiLiang Mu
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  2. Shuai Xian
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  3. JunBin Yu
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  9. Jian He
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Correspondence to JunBin Yu or XiuJian Chou.

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The supporting information is available online at tech.scichina.com and link.springerlink.com. The supporting materials are published as submitted, without typesetting or editing. The responsibility for scientific accuracy and content remains entirely with the authors.

This work was supported by the National Key R&D Program of China (Grant Nos. 2019YFF0301802, 2019YFB2004802 and 2018YFF0300605), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 62101513, 52175554, 51975542), the Applied Fundamental Research Program of Shanxi Province (Grant Nos. 201901D111146, 20210302124170), and Shanxi “1331 Project” Key Subject Construction (Grant No. 1331KSC).

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Mu, J., Xian, S., Yu, J. et al. Flexible and wearable BaTiO3/polyacrylonitrile-based piezoelectric sensor for human posture monitoring. Sci. China Technol. Sci. 65, 858–869 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11431-021-2005-0

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