Waterproof, Light Responsive, and Highly Sensitive Fabric Strain Sensor for Flexible Electronics

Corrosion resistant, durable, and lightweight flexible strain sensor with multiple functionalities is an urgent demand for modern flexible wearable devices. However, currently developed wearable devices are still limited by poor environmental adaptability and functional singleness. In this work, a conductive fabric with multifunctionality in addition to sensing was successfully prepared by assembling zero dimensional silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) and onedimensional carbon nanotubes (CNTs) layer by layer on the surface of the elastic polypropylene nonwoven fabric (named PACS fabric). Polystyrene-block-poly(ethylene-co-butylene)-block-polystyrene (SEBS) added as binder materials favored strong interaction between conductive fillers and the fabric. Benefiting from the synergistic interaction among the conductive fillers with different dimensions and the fabric, the strain sensor based on the conductive fabric showed high sensitivity (GF up to 8064), wide detection range (0-200%), and excellent stability and durability (more than 10000 stretch-release cycles). Besides, the prepared conductive fabric showed superhydrophobicity (water contact angle = 154 degrees) with excellent durability. This ensured the performance stability of the fabric sensor in harsh environments. At the same time, the fabric also showed excellent photothermal conversion performance (90 degrees C at a power density of 0.2 W/cm2 within 20 s). The PACS fabric strain sensor proved excellent performance and environmental adaptability, revealing great potential to be applied in human motion monitoring, self-cleaning, biomedicine, and other fields.

Automated summary

In this work, a multifunctional conductive fabric was successfully prepared and demonstrated excellent performance as a corrosion resistant, durable, and lightweight strain sensor for modern flexible wearable devices. The fabric showed high sensitivity, wide detection range, excellent stability and durability, superhydrophobicity, and efficient photothermal conversion performance.