A Flexible Temperature Sensor for Noncontact Human-Machine Interaction
Shiqi Chen, Xiaolong Han, Peng Hong, Yue Zhang, Xiangyu Yin, Bingwei He
Abstract
Flexible sensors have attracted extensive attention because of their promising applications in the fields of health monitoring, intelligent robots, and electronic skin, etc. During the COVID-19 epidemic, noncontact control of public equipment such as elevators, game consoles, and doors has become particularly important, as it can effectively reduce the risk of cross-infection. In this work, a noncontact flexible temperature sensor is prepared via a simple dip-drying progress, in which poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene):poly(4-styrene sulfonate) (PEDOT:PSS) and printer paper served as the sensing material and the flexible substrate, respectively. We combined the highly sensitive temperature-responsive property of PEDOT:PSS with the good hygroscopicity of printer paper. The prepared sensor shows high sensitivity and good stability in noncontact sensing mode within the temperature range of 20-50 °C. To prove the practicability of the noncontact temperature sensor, a 3 × 2 sensing array is prepared as a noncontact human-machine interface to realize the interaction between player and "Pound-A-Mole game" and a Bluetooth car. These two demos show the sensor's ability to perceive nearby temperature changes, verifying its application potential as a noncontact human-machine interaction interface.