Development and printing of three-dimensional electrodes for the high body adhesion of smart wear

Abstract

Herein, we investigate the effects of 3D printed electrodes on electrophysiological signals and identify the important design elements required for manufacturing better electrodes for high body adhesion for smart wear. Ten electrodes of different shapes (plain, check, stripe, circular, radial cut-out) and thicknesses (0.5 mm and 1.0 mm) were manufactured. The electrodes were evaluated by testing on 20 healthy individuals (10 men and 10 women). To measure the electroencephalogram (EEG) of the participants, we used BIOS-S8 (BioBrain Inc., Korea), an 8-channel polygraph for multibody signal measurement. Data were analyzed using the SPSS 26.0 statistical program. The EEG values were significantly activated according to gender. For the male participants, relative alpha (RA), relative slow theta (RST), relative mid theta (RMT), and the ratio of SMR-mid beta to theta (RSMT) values were highly activated and for the female participants, RA, relative fast alpha (RFA), and relative slow theta (RSA) values were highly activated. There were no significant gendifferences in the EEG of both genders for the 10 types of electrodes. However, for the female participants, the ‘RA’ indices showed a significant difference based on electrode shape on the right temporal lobe (T4), but there was no significant difference based on the thickness. There was a significant difference in the subjective preference of the electrodes also. In the subjective evaluation, it was found that the differences based on the shape and thickness of the electrodes were sensitively recognized.