Researchers have used nanotechnology and additive manufacturing to make a flexible, durable sensor for wearable machines. This will help to monitor all things from crucial signs to athletic accomplishment.
The latest technology created by the University of Waterloo researchers mixes silicone rubber with ultra-thin films of graphene in a substance suitable for creating insoles or wristbands or in running footwear.
When that rubber element moves or bends electrical flags are made by the very conductive, nanoscale graphene fixed in its managed honeycomb construction.
“Silicone gives us the flexibility and durability required for biomonitoring applications, and the added, embedded graphene makes it an effective sensor,” explains the research director at the Multi-Scale Additive Manufacturing (MSAM) Lab at Waterloo, Ehsan Toyserkani. “It’s all together in a single part.”
Making a silicone rubber construction with such intricate inner characteristics is only achievable by the use of state-of-the-art additive manufacturing, also called 3D printing as processes and equipment.
Apart from its highly conductive characteristic, the rubber-graphene part is very stretchy and durable.
“It can be used in the harshest environments, in extreme temperatures and humidity,” says an engineering PhD student at Waterloo, Elham Davoodi who directed the project. He also said that it could even endure being cleaned with your laundry.
The element and the additive manufacturing procedure allow for custom-created machines to exactly fit the body forms of users. This is all while also enhancing comfort as opposed to present wearable tools and lessening production costs because of the simplicity.
Mechanical and mechatronics engineering professor, Toyserkani, stated that the rubber-graphene detector may be matched with electronic pieces. This could help to create wearable machines that register heart and inhaling rates, record the forces exercised when professionals run, enable medics to remotely observe patients and several other potential uses.
The University of British Columbia and the University of California, Los Angeles researchers partnered on the project.
