Artificial multimodal receptors based on ion relaxation dynamics
Insang You, David G. Mackanic, Naoji Matsuhisa, Jiheong Kang, Jimin Kwon, Levent Beker, Jaewan Mun, Wonjeong Suh, Tae Yeong Kim, Jeffrey B.‐H. Tok, Zhenan Bao, Unyong Jeong
Abstract
Feeling temperature and touch The range of receptors in our skin make it possible to sense when we are touching an object and also gives us a general sense of the temperature of that object. Achieving this in an artificial skin-like material has been a challenge because most of the approaches for sensing touch are themselves temperature sensitive. You et al. studied the ion relaxation dynamics in a conductive elastomeric film (see the Perspective by Liu). They show that the ion relaxation time can be used as a strain-insensitive intrinsic variable for detecting temperature and the capacitance can be used as a temperature-insensitive extrinsic variable for sensing the strain, thus decoupling the two so that their signals do not interfere with each other. Science , this issue p. 961 ; see also p. 910