State Key Laboratory of Material Processing and Die & Mould Technology, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074, Hubei, P. R. China.
ARC Hub for Computational Particle Technology, Department of Chemical Engineering, Monash University, Clayton, Victoria 3800, Australia.
ACS Appl Mater Interfaces. 2021 Apr 7;13(13):15727-15737. doi: 10.1021/acsami.1c04457. Epub 2021 Mar 29.
Healthcare monitoring, especially for respiration, has attracted tremendous attention from academics considering the great significance of health information feedback. The respiratory rate, as a critical health indicator, has been used to screen and evaluate potential illness risks in early medical diagnoses. A self-powered sensing system for medical monitoring is critical and imperative due to needless battery replacement and simple assembly. However, the development of a self-powered respiratory sensor with highly sensitive performance is still a daunting challenge. In this work, a compressible and stretchable magnetoelectric sensor (CSMS) with an arch-shaped air gap is reported, enabling self-powered respiratory monitoring driven by exhaled/inhaled breath. The CSMS contains two key functional materials: liquid metals and magnetic powders both with low Young's modulus, allowing for sensing compressibility and stretchability simultaneously. More importantly, such a magnetoelectric sensor exhibits mechanoelectrical converting capacity under an external force, which has been verified by Maxwell numerical simulation. Owing to the air-layer introduction, the magnetoelectric sensors achieve high sensitivity (up to 17.73 kPa), fast response, and long-term stability. The highly sensitive and self-powered magnetoelectric sensor can be further applied as a noninvasive, miniaturized, and portable respiratory monitoring system with the aim of warning for potential health risks. We anticipate that this technique will create an avenue for self-powered respiratory monitoring fields.
医疗监测，尤其是呼吸监测，因其对健康信息反馈的重要意义，引起了学术界的极大关注。呼吸频率作为一个关键的健康指标，已被用于早期医学诊断中的筛选和评估潜在疾病风险。由于无需更换电池和简化组装，用于医疗监测的自供电传感系统至关重要且势在必行。然而，开发具有高灵敏度性能的自供电呼吸传感器仍然是一个艰巨的挑战。在这项工作中，我们报道了一种具有拱形气隙的可压缩和可拉伸磁电传感器 (CSMS)，它可以通过呼出/吸入的呼吸来驱动自供电呼吸监测。CSMS 包含两种关键功能材料：液态金属和磁粉，它们的杨氏模量都较低，允许同时感应可压缩性和可拉伸性。更重要的是，这种磁电传感器在外部力的作用下具有机电转换能力，这已经通过麦克斯韦数值模拟得到了验证。由于引入了空气层，磁电传感器实现了高灵敏度（高达 17.73 kPa）、快速响应和长期稳定性。这种高灵敏度和自供电的磁电传感器可以进一步应用于非侵入式、小型化和便携式呼吸监测系统，以警示潜在的健康风险。我们预计，这项技术将为自供电呼吸监测领域开辟一条新途径。
