Washable stability and sensitive piezoresistive sponge sensor

A washable and sensitivity flexible piezoresistive pressure sensor is necessary to realize the practical application in intelligent wearable field. However, it remains a great challenge to prepare piezoresistive pressure sensor with high sensitivity and superior washable stability. Herein, a 3D porous structure carbon nanotube (CNT)/carbon black (CB) sponge piezoresistive pressure sensor was constructed by salt-template and physical absorption method. The CNT/CB sponge with porous structure exhibited excellent compression cycle stability (372 & PLUSMN; 6 kPa), and lower hysteresis (& LE;9.38 % residual strain). Impressively, the assembled CNT/CB sponge pressure sensor showed high sensitivity of 164 kPa-1 (0-2.1 kPa), 8000 times long-term cycles stability and superior washable stability. The pressure sensor was used for human motion monitoring, such as: pulse, joint bending, micro-expression, foot type recognition and gesture detection. Furthermore, the pressure sensor can be connected with bluetooth module to monitor the gait characteristics of human movement in real time to prevent foot membrane inflammation.

Automated summary

A washable and sensitivity flexible piezoresistive pressure sensor was developed using a 3D porous structure carbon nanotube (CNT)/carbon black (CB) sponge. The sensor exhibited high sensitivity, long-term stability, and superior washable stability. It was used for various human motion monitoring applications and could be connected to a bluetooth module for real-time gait characteristic monitoring to prevent foot membrane inflammation.