School of Advanced Materials Science & Engineering, Sungkyunkwan University, 2066 Seobu-ro, Jangan-gu, Suwon-si, Gyunggi-do, 16419, Korea.
SKKU Advanced Institute of Nano Technology (SAINT), Sungkyunkwan University, 2066 Seobu-ro, Jangan-gu, Suwon-si, Gyunggi-do, 16419, Korea.
Nat Commun. 2020 Jun 2;11(1):2753. doi: 10.1038/s41467-020-16606-w.
Imbuing bio-inspired sensory devices with intelligent functions of human sensory organs has been limited by challenges in emulating the preprocessing abilities of sensory organs such as reception, filtering, adaptation, and sensory memory at the device level itself. Merkel cells, which is a part of tactile sensory organs, form synapse-like connections with afferent neuron terminals referred to as Merkel cell-neurite complexes. Here, inspired by structure and intelligent functions of Merkel cell-neurite complexes, we report a flexible, artificial, intrinsic-synaptic tactile sensory organ that mimics synapse-like connections using an organic synaptic transistor with ferroelectric nanocomposite gate dielectric of barium titanate nanoparticles and poly(vinylidene fluoride-trifluoroethylene). Modulation of the post-synaptic current of the device induced by ferroelectric dipole switching due to triboelectric-capacitive coupling under finger touch allowed reception and slow adaptation. Modulation of synaptic weight by varying the nanocomposite composition of gate dielectric layer enabled tuning of filtering and sensory memory functions.
受限于在器件层面模拟感官器官（如接收、滤波、适应和感官记忆）预处理能力的挑战，将仿生感觉设备注入智能功能一直受到限制。触觉感官器官中的 Merkel 细胞与传入神经元末梢形成类似于突触的连接，称为 Merkel 细胞-轴突复合体。在这里，受 Merkel 细胞-轴突复合体的结构和智能功能的启发，我们报告了一种灵活的、人工的、固有突触的触觉感觉器官，它使用具有铁电纳米复合栅介质的有机突触晶体管模仿类似于突触的连接钛酸钡纳米颗粒和聚（偏二氟乙烯-三氟乙烯）。手指触摸下由于摩擦电电容耦合引起的铁电偶极子翻转导致器件的后突触电流的调制允许接收和缓慢适应。通过改变栅介质层的纳米复合材料组成来调节突触权重，从而实现滤波和感官记忆功能的调整。
