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

Abstract

Wearable electronic skin (e-skin) has provided a revolutionized way to intelligently sense environmental stimuli, which shows prospective applications in health monitoring, artificial intelligence and prosthetics fields. Drawn inspiration from biological skins, developing e-skin with multiple stimuli perception and self-healing abilities not only enrich their bionic multifunctionality, but also greatly improve their sensory performance and functional stability. In this review, we highlight recent important developments in the material structure design strategy to imitate the fascinating functionalities of biological skins, including molecular synthesis, physical structure design, and special biomimicry engineering. Moreover, their specific structure-property relationships, multifunctional application, and existing challenges are also critically analyzed with representative examples. Furthermore, a summary and perspective on future directions and challenges of biomimetic electronic skins regarding function construction will be briefly discussed. We believe that this review will provide valuable guidance for readers to fabricate superior e-skin materials or devices with skin-like multifunctionalities and disparate characteristics.

Bioinspired skin towards next-generation rehabilitation medicine

“…To imitate this sensory ability of human skin, different sensitive conductive architectures are placed upon soft polymer substrates ( Table 1 ). Guo et al have provided a comprehensive review of the recent advances in the design strategy of material structures that imitate the multiple stimuli perception and self-healing functionalities of biological skins ( Guo et al, 2022 ). The electronic sensors with the capacity to detect external stimulus include resistance-, capacity-, piezoelectric-, triboelectric, and potentiometric-type sensors ( Yao et al, 2017 ).…”

Advanced Interfacial Design for Electronic Skins with Customizable Functionalities and Wearability

“…E‐skin systems have generated great interest owing to their system integrations, real‐time availability, high‐quality physiological signal collection, and wearability. [ 26,119,142,145 ] The interface of the E‐skin system, which works as the basis for various functions of E‐skins, has a great impact on the wearability and functionalities of the electronic skin. In this review, beyond the function designs, which have been reviewed in many works, we discussed the interface designs of E‐skin systems.…”

“…Introducing extrinsic self‐healing materials like healing‐agent capsules into E‐skin systems and developing intrinsic self‐healing materials with dynamic covalent and noncovalent interactions for E‐skin systems are the research direction for self‐healing E‐skin systems. [ 118–120 ] Meanwhile, the efficiency of healing process, including the healing degree, healing rate, healing cycles, and energy requirements, restricts the practical application in flexible E‐skin systems. Developing self‐healing E‐skin systems with rapid, autonomous self‐healing at ambient temperature, even under the state of service and without performance deterioration can broaden the widespread application of E‐skin systems. The self‐cleaning capability of E‐skin systems: The self‐cleaning function is also one of the important guarantees the long‐time work stability of E‐skin systems.…”

“…The self-healing function similar to the human skin can make E-skin continue to work in harsh environments or after damage. [118][119][120] The above-mentioned intermolecular bonds can not only realize the self-adhesive interface of the E-skin system, but also provide the self-healing function for the E-skin system. [9,18,30,90,99,113,115,117,118,121,122] Noncovalent interactions like hydrogen bonds, [9,99,113,121] metal coordination, [90,122] electrostatic interactions, [9] etc.…”

Self-Healing Mechanical Properties of Selected Roofing Felts

“…In addition, some materials mimic the transparent, luminescent, and SH properties of nature [ 4 ]. Next, in [ 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 ], the new materials that may find an application in wearables, stretchable sensors in the field of healthcare, and electronic skins are investigated. Another field where materials with SH abilities may be valuable is medicine [ 9 ], where the SH ability of the presented nontoxic hydrogel, reinforced with montmorillonite, makes it a valuable medical treatment.…”