Lee Juyeong, Park Haechan, Kim Sehyun, Liu Chang, Li Zhengwei, Sim Kyoseung
Department of Chemistry, Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology (UNIST), Ulsan, Republic of Korea.
Department of Biomedical Engineering, University of Houston, Houston, TX, USA.
Nat Commun. 2025 Mar 5;16(1):2225. doi: 10.1038/s41467-025-57498-y.
Irreproducible wrinkling, characterized by randomly arranged ridges or creases on material surfaces, has significant potential for application in entity identification and anti-counterfeiting. However, active research in this field is hindered because the existing wrinkling methods face challenges in realizing discernible patterns and potential applications of submillimeter-scale wavelength wrinkles are yet to be identified. Herein, we propose a strategy to create unique and irreproducible styrene-ethylene-butylene-styrene (SEBS) wrinkles using "spin evaporation", a technique that rapidly removes the solvent by spinning. We demonstrate the realization of SEBS wrinkles with wavelengths of hundreds of micrometers with high randomness, irreproducibility, and resistance to external stimuli. Importantly, to demonstrate the potential application of the wrinkle, we suggest and fabricate a human-finger-like fully soft identifiable artificial finger pad electronics and integrate it with a soft bimodal sensing system. The artificial finger pad mimics human finger pad features such as identification, object recognition, and effective grasping. Further integration of this pad into soft robots, cephalopods, and prosthetic skin offers insightful potential for the proposed wrinkling method in various fields.
不可复制的起皱现象,其特征是材料表面出现随机排列的纹路或褶皱,在实体识别和防伪方面具有巨大的应用潜力。然而,该领域的积极研究受到阻碍,因为现有的起皱方法在实现可辨别图案方面面临挑战,且亚毫米级波长皱纹的潜在应用尚未得到确认。在此,我们提出一种策略,利用“旋转蒸发”(一种通过旋转快速去除溶剂的技术)来制造独特且不可复制的苯乙烯-乙烯-丁烯-苯乙烯(SEBS)皱纹。我们展示了实现具有数百微米波长的SEBS皱纹,其具有高度的随机性、不可复制性以及对外界刺激的抗性。重要的是,为了证明这种皱纹的潜在应用,我们设计并制造了一种类似人类手指的全软可识别的人工指垫电子器件,并将其与一个软双模态传感系统集成。该人工指垫模仿了人类指垫的特征,如识别、物体识别和有效抓握。将这种指垫进一步集成到软机器人、头足类动物和人造皮肤中,为所提出的起皱方法在各个领域提供了具有洞察力的潜力。