Department of Information and Communication Engineering, Daegu Gyeongbuk Institute of Science and Technology (DGIST), Daegu, Korea.
IMEP-LAHC, Grenoble Institute of Technology(Minatec), Grenoble, France.
Soft Robot. 2019 Dec;6(6):745-759. doi: 10.1089/soro.2018.0049. Epub 2019 Jul 23.
An artificial tactile system has attracted tremendous interest and intensive study, since it can be applied as a new functional interface between humans and electronic devices. Unfortunately, most previous works focused on improving the sensitivity of sensors. However, humans also respond to psychological feelings for sensations such as pain, softness, or roughness, which are important factors for interacting with others and objects. Here, we present an electronic skin concept that generates a "pain" warning signal, specifically, to sharp "prick" and "hot" sensations. To simplify the sensor structure for these two feelings, a single-body tactile sensor design is proposed. By exploiting "hot" feeling based on the Seebeck effect instead of the pyroelectric property, it is possible to distinguish points registering a "hot" feeling from those generating a "prick" feeling, which is based on the piezoelectric effect. The control of free carrier concentration in nanowire induced the appropriate level of Seebeck current, which enabled the sensor system to be more reliable. The first derivatives of the piezo and Seebeck output signals are the key factors for the signal processing of the "pain" feeling. The main idea can be applied to mimic other psychological tactile feelings.
人工触觉系统引起了极大的兴趣和深入的研究，因为它可以作为人类和电子设备之间的新功能接口。然而，以前的大多数研究都集中在提高传感器的灵敏度上。然而，人类也会对疼痛、柔软或粗糙等感觉的心理感受做出反应，这些感觉是与他人和物体进行交互的重要因素。在这里，我们提出了一种电子皮肤的概念，它可以产生“疼痛”警告信号，特别是针对尖锐的“刺痛”和“热”感觉。为了简化这两种感觉的传感器结构，提出了一种单体触觉传感器设计。通过利用基于塞贝克效应的“热”感觉而不是热释电特性，可以区分产生“热”感觉的点和基于压电效应产生“刺痛”感觉的点。纳米线中自由载流子浓度的控制诱导出适当水平的塞贝克电流，这使得传感器系统更加可靠。压电和塞贝克输出信号的一阶导数是“疼痛”感觉信号处理的关键因素。这个主要的思想可以应用于模拟其他心理触觉感觉。
