Wang Xiaowei, Shangguan Peijun, Huang Pingjie, Hou Dibo
State Key Laboratory of Industrial Control Technology, College of Control Science and Engineering, Zhejiang University.
State Key Laboratory of Industrial Control Technology, College of Control Science and Engineering, Zhejiang University;
J Vis Exp. 2023 Mar 17(193). doi: 10.3791/65175.
Flexible and stretchable electrodes are essential components in soft artificial sensory systems. Despite recent advances in flexible electronics, most electrodes are either restricted by the patterning resolution or the capability of inkjet printing with high-viscosity super-elastic materials. In this paper, we present a simple strategy to fabricate microchannel-based stretchable composite electrodes, which can be achieved by scraping elastic conductive polymer composites (ECPCs) into lithographically embossed microfluidic channels. The ECPCs were prepared by a volatile solvent evaporation method, which achieves a uniform dispersion of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) in a polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) matrix. Compared to conventional fabrication methods, the proposed technique can facilitate the rapid fabrication of well-defined stretchable electrodes with high-viscosity slurry. Since the electrodes in this work were made up of all-elastomeric materials, strong interlinks can be formed between the ECPCs-based electrodes and the PDMS-based substrate at the interfaces of the microchannel walls, which allows the electrodes to exhibit mechanical robustness under high tensile strains. In addition, the mechanical-electric response of the electrodes was also systematically studied. Finally, a soft pressure sensor was developed by combining a dielectric silicone foam and an interdigitated electrodes (IDE) layer, and this demonstrated great potential for pressure sensors in soft robotic tactile sensing applications.
柔性可拉伸电极是软人工传感系统的关键组件。尽管柔性电子学近来取得了进展，但大多数电极要么受到图案化分辨率的限制，要么受到用高粘度超弹性材料进行喷墨打印的能力的限制。在本文中，我们提出了一种制造基于微通道的可拉伸复合电极的简单策略，该策略可通过将弹性导电聚合物复合材料（ECPC）刮入光刻压花的微流体通道中来实现。ECPC是通过挥发性溶剂蒸发法制备的，该方法实现了碳纳米管（CNT）在聚二甲基硅氧烷（PDMS）基质中的均匀分散。与传统制造方法相比，所提出的技术可以促进用高粘度浆料快速制造轮廓清晰的可拉伸电极。由于这项工作中的电极由全弹性体材料制成，因此在微通道壁的界面处，基于ECPC的电极与基于PDMS的基板之间可以形成牢固的互连，这使得电极在高拉伸应变下表现出机械稳健性。此外，还系统地研究了电极的机电响应。最后，通过结合介电硅酮泡沫和叉指电极（IDE）层开发了一种软压力传感器，这证明了压力传感器在软机器人触觉传感应用中的巨大潜力。
