A Novel Transparent Dielectric Elastomer Sensor for Compressive Force Measurements

Dielectric elastomer sensors show great potential for wearable electronics and mechatronic applications. However, these sensors have some deficiencies in their appearance and low sensitivity to compressive force measurements. We demonstrate a novel dielectric elastomer sensor enabled by ionic liquid that has fully transparent appearance, low resistivity and the capacity of actuation at large-scale frequencies. We investigate the basic mechanical behaviors of the sensor experimentally. It is noted that the sensor has a remarkable sensitivity to measure compressive force, which is higher than the existing stacked dielectric elastomer sensors.