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Soft multifunctional neurological electronic skin through intrinsically stretchable synaptic transistor

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Abstract

Neurological electronic skin (E-skin) can process and transmit information in a distributed manner that achieves effective stimuli perception, holding great promise in neuroprosthetics and soft robotics. Neurological E-skin with multifunctional perception abilities can enable robots to precisely interact with the complex surrounding environment. However, current neurological E-skins that possess tactile, thermal, and visual perception abilities are usually prepared with rigid materials, bringing difficulties in realizing biologically synapse-like softness. Here, we report a soft multifunctional neurological E-skin (SMNE) comprised of a poly(3-hexylthiophene) (P3HT) nanofiber polymer semiconductor-based stretchable synaptic transistor and multiple soft artificial sensory receptors, which is capable of effectively perceiving force, thermal, and light stimuli. The stretchable synaptic transistor can convert electrical signals into transient channel currents analogous to the biological excitatory postsynaptic currents. And it also possesses both short-term and long-term synaptic plasticity that mimics the human memory system. By integrating a stretchable triboelectric nanogenerator, a soft thermoelectric device, and an elastic photodetector as artificial receptors, we further developed an SMNE that enables the robot to make precise actions in response to various surrounding stimuli. Compared with traditional neurological E-skin, our SMNE can maintain the softness and adaptability of biological synapses while perceiving multiple stimuli including force, temperature, and light. This SMNE could promote the advancement of E-skins for intelligent robot applications.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 62074137), the Science and Technology Research and Development Program Joint Fund of Henan (No. 232301420033), and the China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (Nos. 2021TQ0288 and 2022M712852).

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Author notes

  1. Pengcheng Zhu and Shuairong Mu contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory of Materials Physics of Ministry of Education, School of Physics and Microelectronics, Zhengzhou University, Zhengzhou, 450001, China

    Pengcheng Zhu, Shuairong Mu, Wenhao Huang, Yuyang Lin, Ke Chen, Zhifeng Pan & Yanchao Mao

  2. School of Mechanical and Power Engineering, Zhengzhou University, Zhengzhou, 450001, China

    Zeye Sun & Junlei Wang

  3. Department of Chemistry, Shahid Beheshti University, Tehran, 1983969411, Iran

    Mohsen Golbon Haghighi & Roya Sedghi

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  1. Pengcheng Zhu
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  2. Shuairong Mu
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  3. Wenhao Huang
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  4. Zeye Sun
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  5. Yuyang Lin
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  6. Ke Chen
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  10. Junlei Wang
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Correspondence to Junlei Wang or Yanchao Mao.

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Electronic Supplementary Material: Soft multifunctional neurological electronic skin through intrinsically stretchable synaptic transistor

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Zhu, P., Mu, S., Huang, W. et al. Soft multifunctional neurological electronic skin through intrinsically stretchable synaptic transistor. Nano Res. (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-024-6566-8

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