Li Sheng, Chen Xiaoliang, Li Xiangming, Tian Hongmiao, Wang Chunhui, Nie Bangbang, He Juan, Shao Jinyou
Micro-/Nano-technology Research Center, State Key Laboratory for Manufacturing Systems Engineering, Xi'an Jiaotong University, Xi'an 710049, Shaanxi, China.
Frontier Institute of Science and Technology (FIST), Xi'an Jiaotong University, Xi'an 710049, Shaanxi, China.
Sci Adv. 2022 Dec 2;8(48):eade0720. doi: 10.1126/sciadv.ade0720.
Human-like tactile perception is critical for promoting robotic intelligence. However, reproducing tangential "sliding" perception of human skin is still struggling. Inspired by the lateral gating mechanosensing mechanism of mechanosensory cells, which perceives mechanical stimuli by lateral tension-induced opening-closing of ion channels, we report a robot skin (R-skin) with mechanically gated electron channels, achieving ultrasensitive and fast-response sliding tactile perception via pyramidal artificial fingerprint-triggered opening-closing of electron gates (E-gates, namely, customized V-shaped cracks within embedded mesh electron channels). By imitating cytomembrane to modulate membrane mechanics, local strain is enhanced at E-gates to effectively regulate electron pathways for high sensitivity while weakened at other positions to suppress random cracks for robust stability. The R-skin can directly recognize ultrafine surface microstructure (5 μm) at a response frequency (485 Hz) outshining humans and achieve human-like sliding perception functions, including dexterously distinguishing texture of complex-shaped objects and providing real-time feedback for grasping.
类人触觉感知对于提升机器人智能至关重要。然而，再现人类皮肤的切向“滑动”感知仍面临困难。受机械感觉细胞的侧向门控机械传感机制启发，该机制通过侧向张力诱导离子通道的开闭来感知机械刺激，我们报道了一种具有机械门控电子通道的机器人皮肤（R-皮肤），通过金字塔形人工指纹触发电子门（E-门，即嵌入式网状电子通道内定制的V形裂缝）的开闭，实现超灵敏和快速响应的滑动触觉感知。通过模仿细胞膜来调节膜力学，E-门处的局部应变增强，以有效调节电子通路实现高灵敏度，而其他位置的应变减弱，以抑制随机裂缝确保稳健稳定性。该R-皮肤能够以超过人类的响应频率（485 Hz）直接识别超细表面微观结构（5μm），并实现类人滑动感知功能，包括灵巧地区分复杂形状物体的纹理以及为抓取提供实时反馈。
