Sensors as comfy as a second skin

摘要

LIGHT as a feather and just 1 micrometre thin, a plastic sheet peppered with sensors could lead to unobtrusive medical implants, or provide "sensing skins" for prosthetic limbs or robots. Building a sensor circuit normally involves depositing high-energy plasma ions on a surface. But this process can damage soft, skin-like materials. So researchers at the University of Tokyo in Japan have worked out a way to deposit a thin layer of aluminium oxide onto a polymer foil at room temperature, and then attached sensors to that oxide layer (Nature, doi.orgbb).