A Flexible Temperature Sensor for Noncontact Human-Machine Interaction

Abstract

Flexible sensors have attracted extensive attention because of their promising applications in the fields of health monitoring, intelligent robots, and electronic skin, etc. During the COVID-19 epidemic, noncontact control of public equipment such as elevators, game consoles, and doors has become particularly important, as it can effectively reduce the risk of cross-infection. In this work, a noncontact flexible temperature sensor is prepared via a simple dip-drying progress, in which poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene):poly(4-styrene sulfonate) (PEDOT:PSS) and printer paper served as the sensing material and the flexible substrate, respectively. We combined the highly sensitive temperature-responsive property of PEDOT:PSS with the good hygroscopicity of printer paper. The prepared sensor shows high sensitivity and good stability in noncontact sensing mode within the temperature range of 20–50 °C. To prove the practicability of the noncontact temperature sensor, a 3 × 2 sensing array is prepared as a noncontact human-machine interface to realize the interaction between player and “Pound-A-Mole game” and a Bluetooth car. These two demos show the sensor′s ability to perceive nearby temperature changes, verifying its application potential as a noncontact human-machine interaction interface.

Optical Sensor Implementation for Health Care Monitoring Based on Optical Fiber Technology: A Review

“…In S. Chen et al, [18], since flexible sensors are employed in a variety of applications, including electronic skin, intelligent robotics, and health monitoring, the researchers in this study used a direct drying process to create a noncontact flexible temperature sensor. During the COVID-19 epidemic, avoiding contact with public devices such as elevators, game consoles, and doors has been crucial because it can significantly lower the risk of transmission.…”

Recent Advances in Electronic Skins with Multiple-Stimuli-Responsive and Self-Healing Abilities

“…Benefiting from the piezoelectric and pyroelectric attributes, human skin is not only able to detect various physical force stimuli such as tactile and tensile stress, but also has superb capacities to monitor some physical chemistry stimuli. Among these biomimicking multiple-stimuli perception, wearable electronic devices with skin-like force and temperature perceptual abilities have attracted the most extensive concerns, which shows great potentials in robotic, prosthetics and healthcare applications [ 61 , 62 , 63 , 64 , 65 ]. Specifically, graphene, CNTs, PANI nanoparticles, Ag nanocrystals, stretchable metal and Si nanoribbons with special structure design (such as serpentine, wrinkle, net-shaped) are widely chosen as the promising thermosensitive elements for multifunctional e-skin devices [ 66 , 67 , 68 , 69 ].…”

A Robust Bridge‐Type Airflow Sensor Based on Flexible Superhydrophobic Carbon Nanotube Fiber Thin Films

“…[12][13][14] Being an important member in the sensor family, airflow sensors are extensively equipped and playing a crucial role in aerospace, weather forecast, mining industry, environmental monitoring, biomedical engineering, electronic skin, wearable textiles, and integrated smart devices. [15,16,17,8,[18][19][20][21] Most traditional airflow sensors utilize redox reactions between some gases in the air and semiconducting oxide sensitive elements to alter resistance of the sensitive elements and hence realize airflow detection. [22] In other cases, strain effect [23] and piezoelectric effect [24,25] mechanisms are also adopted for airflow sensing.…”