Highly Breathable and Stretchable Strain Sensors with Insensitive Response to Pressure and Bending

TLDR

Wearable tensile strain sensors are gaining attention for restoring tactile inputs in humans and robots, yet conventional devices suffer from pressure and bending sensitivity and limited breathability. This study reports a breathable, pressure‑ and bending‑insensitive strain sensor that achieves high sensitivity, remarkable linearity (gauge factor 49.5, R² = 99.5%), a 0–200 % sensing range, and superior moisture, air, and water‑vapor permeability. The sensor’s design incorporates breathable, flexible materials that decouple strain from pressure and bending, enabling the reported performance. It exhibits negligible response to 0–100 kPa pressure and 0–75 % bending, providing a new route to comfortable, high‑performance, anti‑jamming strain sensors.

Abstract

Abstract Wearable tensile strain sensors have aroused substantial attention on account of their exciting applications in rebuilding tactile inputs of human and intelligent robots. Conventional such devices, however, face the dilemma of both sensitive response to pressure and bending stimulations, and poor breathability for wearing comfort. In this paper, a breathable, pressure and bending insensitive strain sensor is reported, which presents fascinating properties including high sensitivity and remarkable linearity (gauge factor of 49.5 in strain 0–100%, R 2 = 99.5%), wide sensing range (up to 200%), as well as superior permeability to moisture, air, and water vapor. On the other hand, it exhibits negligible response to wide‐range pressure (0–100 kPa) and bending (0–75%) inputs. This work provides a new route for achieving wearing comfortable, high‐performance, and anti‐jamming strain sensors.