Superstretching MXene Composite Hydrogel as a Bidirectional Stress Response Thixotropic Sensor
Siqi Chen, Yongjie Dong, Song Ma, Jiayuan Ren, Xipeng Yang, Yingjie Wang, Shaoyu Lü
Abstract
The arrival of the era of artificial intelligence is constantly advancing the development of flexible electronic materials. However, low mechanical properties, nonflexible signal transmission, and insensitive signal output have restricted their development as sensors. In this study, a superstretching MXene composite conductive hydrogel was developed with a tensile strain of more than 1800%. The hydrogel was used as a flexible wearable sensor to detect human motion signals in real time. High sensitivity was achieved using the sensor to discern multidirectional human motions, such as bending of human joints, throat vocalization, swallowing, and pulse beat. In addition, rapid resilience was observed for the MXene composite hydrogel after unloading reverse compressive stress, which can quickly cause a specific current response in the micropressure area without leaving any traces. This thixotropic sensor achieves a rapid response to bidirectional stress and has huge application prospects in the field of human body motion detection and national defense information encryption.