Soft, stretchable, high power density electronic skin-based biofuel cells for scavenging energy from human sweat

Bandodkar, Amay J.; You, Jung‐Min; Kim, Nam-Heon; Gu, Yue; Kumar, Rajan; Mohan, A. M. Vinu; Kurniawan, Jonas; Imani, Somayeh; Nakagawa, Tatsuo; Parish, Brianna; Parthasarathy, Mukunth; Mercier, Patrick P.; Xu, Sheng; Wang, Joseph

doi:10.1039/c7ee00865a

Cited by 344 publications

(284 citation statements)

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“…While ultimately constrained by the strain limit of the stiff internal materials, these circuits can interface well with existing devices, thereby enabling advanced sensing capabilities in soft circuits. Some work has taken steps towards untethered batteryfree circuitry by employing near-field communication (NFC) schemes to provide power and transmit data 74,80 NaTuRe elecTRoNics demonstrated untethered wearable devices by powering electronics and Bluetooth using lactate from human sweat 81 . Nanomaterials and conductive elastomer composites.…”

Section: Artificial Skin Electronicsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Alternatively, components for power delivery can be engineered to be more lightweight and flexible in order to improve the portability of untethered soft devices. Recent work includes stretchable batteries 116,125 and elements that generate power by harvesting sweat in a stretchable electronic-skin-based biofuel cell 81 , incorporating flexible photovoltaics into a skin-conformal layer 126 or including thin stretchable triboelectric nanogenerators 127 .…”

Section: Nature Electronicsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Untethered soft robotics

2018

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Research in soft matter engineering has introduced new approaches in robotics and wearable devices that can interface with the human body and adapt to unpredictable environments. However, many promising applications are limited by the dependence of soft systems on electrical or pneumatic tethers. Recent work in soft actuation and electronics has made removing such cords more feasible, heralding a variety of applications from autonomous field robotics to wireless biomedical devices. Here we review the development of functional untethered soft robotics. We focus on recent advances in soft robotic actuation, sensing and integration as they relate to untethered systems, and consider the key challenges the field faces in engineering systems that could have practical use in real-world conditions.

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Section: Artificial Skin Electronicsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Nature Electronicsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Untethered soft robotics

2018

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“…At the large scale, the main challenge lies in the environmental issues involved in powering cities in a sustainable manner; at the medium scale, the main challenge lies at simultaneously high energy and power density to drive electrical vehicles; at the small scale, the main challenge is how to power wearable and implantable devices anytime and anywhere without the need of external power supply of bulky connecting wires. [16,17] To date, some biofuel cell based stretchable energy devices have been developed to power wearable electronic devices. [1][2][3][4][5] However, current energy devices remain bulky and rigid.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Intrinsically Stretchable Fuel Cell Based on Enokitake‐Like Standing Gold Nanowires

Zhai

Liu

Wang

et al. 2019

Advanced Energy Materials

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Depending on the scale involved, there are different challenges in contemporary energy research. At the large scale, the main challenge lies in the environmental issues involved in powering cities in a sustainable manner; at the medium scale, the main challenge lies at simultaneously high energy and power density to drive electrical vehicles; at the small scale, the main challenge is how to power wearable and implantable devices anytime and anywhere without the need of external power supply of bulky connecting wires. To realize this latter goal, energy conversion/storage devices need to be ultrathin yet highly functional when being bent, twisted, and stretched. [1][2][3][4][5] However, current energy devices remain bulky and rigid. Despite the development of commercial paper batteries, these devices are not stretchable. [6,7] Therefore, it is highly desirable to develop thinner, softer, more biocompatible, and skin-conformal energy technologies to power future medical devices.It is encouraging to witness recent growing interest in stretchable devices including battery, [8,9] photovoltaics, [10,11] triboelectric generator, [12,13] supercapacitor, [14,15] and fuel cells. [16,17] To date, some biofuel cell based stretchable energy devices have been developed to power wearable electronic devices. [16][17][18][19] Nevertheless, their performance depends largely on the enzyme or bacteria, [16,[19][20][21] and their activity is affected by many factors, including the temperature and pH. [22,23] In contrast, methanol or ethanol based fuel cells have been shown to offer a much higher efficiency and reliability [24] because they are not influenced by external biological environments. To fabricate flexible fuel cells, specially designed electrodes or catalysts are required. In this context, carbon fiber paper or carbon cloth, [25,26] graphene paper, [27] and nickel foam [28] have been successfully utilized to fabricate flexible methanol or ethanol fuel cells. It is possible to design bendable on-chip fuel cells by imprinting Au on cycloolefin polymer films. [29] Ultralong Ag nanowires have been deposited onto polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) forming percolation network, which can be used as current collectors for bendable fuel cells. [30] Despite the encouraging progress made so far, it remains highly challenging to fabricate stretchable fuel cells, which require new design of the electrodes and electro-catalysts. Conventional fuel cells are based on rigid electrodes, limiting their applications in wearable and implantable electronics.Here, it is demonstrated that enokitake-like vertically-aligned standing gold nanowires (v-AuNWs) can also serve as powerful platform for stretchable fuel cells by using ethanol as model system. Unlike traditional fuel cell electrodes, the v-AuNWs have "Janus Morphology" on both sides of the film and also are highly stretchable. The comparative studies demonstrate that tail side exposed v-AuNWs based stretchable electrodes outperform the head-side exposed v-AuNWs toward the electro-oxidation of eth...

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“…RF energy, [31] light, [32] body heat, [33] body motion, [34] and also human sweat [35] have been reported as energy sources for wearable devices. These two properties are also very important for the building of an all wearable monitoring system, as the emerging wearable energy supplies always have a quite low efficiency.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Highly Sensitive, Low Voltage Operation, and Low Power Consumption Resistive Strain Sensors Based on Vertically Oriented Graphene Nanosheets

Jiang

Tang

Wang

et al. 2019

Adv Materials Technologies

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Stretchable sensors, including integration of traditional sensors on soft substrates and direct employment of stretchable sensitive materials, have attracted much attention from both researchers and engineers recently. Among them, the strain and pressure sensors for transverse stretch and vertical compression have shown promising potential in applications in fields such as electronic skin, electronic fabrics, human-computer interface, and health care. [1][2][3][4][5][6] As the strain and also the pressure sensing are mainly based on the deformation of the sensitive material, they are often detectable with in-equable sensitivity by a single device. [7] A strain or pressure sensor can signify micromovement of muscles such as the voice, artery pulses, and facial expressions, which makes it possible for health monitoring, medical diagnosis, and even assistance of drug delivery. [8][9][10][11][12] Metal and semiconductor materials are commonly used for strain sensors. The metallic strain sensors are restricted by low sensitivity while the semiconductor ones have thermal effect and resistive drift during the stretching process, which limits the sensor resolution.Graphene and carbon nanotubes, known for their excellent mechanical property and thermal stability, have provided better choices for strain sensors and been extensively studied. [13][14][15][16][17][18][19] It has been shown that, single layer graphene is not sensitive enough to strains. It is often used as function layers to structure strain sensors which makes the fabrication process much more complicated. [13,14] A great deal of other graphene related materials have then been explored. Graphene overlaps, [15][16][17] quasi-3D graphene films, [20,21] and polymers incorporated with graphene [22][23][24] are among the most studied to construct strain sensors. Better device performance has been achieved with them. However, building a high-performance strain sensor based on graphene for practical utilization is still a big challenge.Structure modification is a commonly applied method to enhance the device performance for the materials mentioned above. Properties such as the sensitivity and signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) can be improved this way. Model-transferring, benefiting from the advantages of simplicity, low cost, and time Flexible and stretchable electronics are essential module of mobile wearable devices, soft human-machine interfaces, and also e-skin on biomedical prostheses and biorobotics. Strain sensors, as one of the major part of flexible electronics, have been extensively studied recently. When being used for mobile and long-term applications, low power consumption and low operation voltage beside high sensitivity and fast response of the sensors are required. Easy integration is also an important aspect to build an internet of things. Here, resistive strain sensors with a maximum gauge factor of 150, a fast response time of about 10 ms, a low operation voltage of 20 mV, and a low power consumption of <8 µW, are demonstrated by introducing easily patt...

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Soft, stretchable, high power density electronic skin-based biofuel cells for scavenging energy from human sweat

Abstract: A soft, stretchable wearable biofuel cell producing ∼1 mW power from sweat is presented.

Cited by 344 publications

References 59 publications

Untethered soft robotics

Untethered soft robotics

Intrinsically Stretchable Fuel Cell Based on Enokitake‐Like Standing Gold Nanowires

Highly Sensitive, Low Voltage Operation, and Low Power Consumption Resistive Strain Sensors Based on Vertically Oriented Graphene Nanosheets

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