Design and Development of OECT Logic Circuits for Electrical Stimulation Applications

Featured Application Electrical stimulation applies controlled electrical pulses to produce a desired response from the human body, which may be muscle contraction, sensory stimuli, cell proliferation, active delivery of targeted substances through ionophoresis, etc. Printed electronics are a promising approach to increase the wearability and personalization of mass-produced electrical stimulation devices. This paper presents the first successful implementation of fully printed electronics for flexible and wearable smart multi-pad stimulation electrodes intended for use in medical, sports and lifestyle applications. The smart multi-pad electrodes with the electronic circuits based on organic electrochemical transistor (OECT)-based electronic circuits comprising the 3-8 decoder for active pad selection and high current throughput transistors for switching were produced by multi-layer screen printing. Devices with different architectures of switching transistors were tested in relevant conditions for electrical stimulation applications. An automated testbed with a configurable stimulation source and an adjustable human model equivalent circuit was developed for this purpose. Three of the proposed architectures successfully routed electrical currents of up to 15 mA at an output voltage of 30 V, while one was reliably performing even at 40 V. The presented results demonstrate feasibility of the concept in a range of conditions relevant to several applications of electrical stimulation.

Automated summary

This paper presents the first successful implementation of fully printed electronics for flexible and wearable smart multi-pad stimulation electrodes, demonstrating their feasibility in electrical stimulation applications.