Large-Area High-Resolution Skin-Inspired Flexible Tactile Sensor for Robotic Electronic Skin

Abstract

With the development of flexible electronics, flexible tactile sensors for electronic skin have gained significant attention in various fields, including intelligent robotics and human–computer interaction. However, the existing methods for robotic electronic skin face challenges to simultaneously achieve high resolution, large-area coverage, and cost-effectiveness, particularly when applied to curved surfaces. Inspired by human skin, we developed a large-area, high-resolution flexible tactile sensor for electronic skin. The sensor exhibits excellent tactile sensing capabilities even on curved surfaces, enabling the detection of both the distribution and the variation of contact forces. In addition, the rhombic grid array electrode layer enables adjustable resolution, achieving a resolution higher than that of human skin. Experimental results demonstrate the sensor’s good performance in detection and recognition tasks on curved surfaces. The sensor exhibits a minimum detectable force of 0.01 N (68 Pa), and it maintains good sensing ability after 10,000 loading–unloading cycles. Furthermore, the sensor can detect slippage and recognize gestures, enabling measurement of the direction and velocity of objects moving across its surface and has potential applications in fields such as human–machine interaction and intelligent robotics.