The closed-loop HMI system could compliantly interface with human body for teleoperating various robotics with haptic feedback.
Capabilities for continuous monitoring of pressures and temperatures at critical skin interfaces can help to guide care strategies that minimize the potential for pressure injuries in hospitalized patients or in individuals confined to the bed. This paper introduces a soft, skin-mountable class of sensor system for this purpose. The design includes a pressure-responsive element based on membrane deflection and a battery-free, wireless mode of operation capable of multi-site measurements at strategic locations across the body. Such devices yield continuous, simultaneous readings of pressure and temperature in a sequential readout scheme from a pair of primary antennas mounted under the bedding and connected to a wireless reader and a multiplexer located at the bedside. Experimental evaluation of the sensor and the complete system includes benchtop measurements and numerical simulations of the key features. Clinical trials involving two hemiplegic patients and a tetraplegic patient demonstrate the feasibility, functionality and long-term stability of this technology in operating hospital settings.
Chronic wounds, particularly those associated with diabetes mellitus, represent a growing threat to public health, with additional notable economic impacts. Inflammation associated with these wounds leads to abnormalities in endogenous electrical signals that impede the migration of keratinocytes needed to support the healing process. This observation motivates the treatment of chronic wounds with electrical stimulation therapy, but practical engineering challenges, difficulties in removing stimulation hardware from the wound site, and absence of means to monitor the healing process create barriers to widespread clinical use. Here, we demonstrate a miniaturized wireless, battery-free bioresorbable electrotherapy system that overcomes these challenges. Studies based on a splinted diabetic mouse wound model confirm the efficacy for accelerated wound closure by guiding epithelial migration, modulating inflammation, and promoting vasculogenesis. Changes in the impedance provide means for tracking the healing process. The results demonstrate a simple and effective platform for wound site electrotherapy.
Tactile sensations are mainly transmitted to each other by physical touch. Wireless touch perception could be a revolution for us to interact with the world. Here, we report a wireless self-sensing and haptic-reproducing electronic skin (e-skin) to realize noncontact touch communications. A flexible self-sensing actuator was developed to provide an integrated function in both tactile sensing and haptic feedback. When this e-skin was dynamically pressed, the actuator generated an induced voltage as tactile information. Via wireless communication, another e-skin could receive this tactile data and run a synchronized haptic reproduction. Thus, touch could be wirelessly conveyed in bidirections between two users as a touch intercom. Furthermore, this e-skin could be connected with various smart devices to form a touch internet of things where one-to-one and one-to-multiple touch delivery could be realized. This wireless touch presents huge potentials in remote touch video, medical care/assistance, education, and many other applications.
Skin-integrated electronics, also known as electronic skin (e-skin), are rapidly developing and are gradually being adopted in biomedical fields as well as in our daily lives. E-skin capable of providing sensitive and high-resolution tactile sensations and haptic feedback to the human body would open a new e-skin paradigm for closed-loop human–machine interfaces. Here, we report a class of materials and mechanical designs for the miniaturization of mechanical actuators and strategies for their integration into thin, soft e-skin for haptic interfaces. The mechanical actuators exhibit small dimensions of 5 mm diameter and 1.45 mm thickness and work in an electromagnetically driven vibrotactile mode with resonance frequency overlapping the most sensitive frequency of human skin. Nine mini actuators can be integrated simultaneously in a small area of 2 cm × 2 cm to form a 3 × 3 haptic feedback array, which is small and compact enough to mount on a thumb tip. Furthermore, the thin, soft haptic interface exhibits good mechanical properties that work properly during stretching, bending, and twisting and therefore can conformally fit onto various parts of the human body to afford programmable tactile enhancement and Braille recognition with an accuracy rate over 85%.
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