Shape-Memory-Alloys Enabled Actuatable Fiber Sensors via the Preform-to-Fiber Fabrication

摘要

Integrative actuators and sensors within a single active device offer compelling capabilities in developing robotics, prosthetic limbs, and minimally invasive surgical tools. However, instrumenting smart and active devices with miniaturized sizes for easy customizability and high yield is largely restricted by the current manufacturing technologies. Here, we report the development of flexible polymer-based actuatable fiber sensors, produced by the preform-to-fiber thermal drawing process. It has both mechanical actuation realized by the incorporated shape-memory alloy (SMA) wires and biochemical sensing provided by carbon-based composite materials. The tip of such a fiber could be actuated with a high spatiotemporal resolution by the shape-memory effect. And, its integrated carbon composite exhibits intrinsically high sensitivity toward electroactive molecules. Here, we showed it can selectively detect adrenaline as low as 100 nM with the coexistence of major interferent molecules. We succeeded in using such an actuatable fiber sensor to target the bifurcated vessel model and capture the localized adrenaline information. The actuatable fiber sensor technologies developed here can greatly push the technological advancement in the soft and flexible robotic fields to include additional functions on top of their pure mechanical behaviors and open possibilities for achieving closed-loop control for high-precision operations.