Sandwich Structure-based of Zinc Nanoparticle-enhanced Flexible Sensor

Abstract

ABSTRACT Piezoresistive materials have excellent deformation response behavior, and their applications have expanded to include flexible sensors for human health monitoring. Existing studies have shown that by modifying the metal nanoparticles, sensors’ piezoresistive responses can be improved. As a result, in order to improve the detection ability of the chopped carbon fiber/polydimethylsiloxane (CCF/PDMS) composite for deformation behavior, zinc nanoparticles were used to modify the interlayer CCF at the microscopic scale, and systematic tests on the properties of the modified devices were conducted in this study. The results revealed that the resistance noise of the unmodified device was 60 ± 2 Ω, which dropped to 5 ± 2 Ω after modification, representing a reduction of up to 91.7%. When the device was modified with zinc nanoparticles for 180 seconds, its maximum signal-to-noise ratio was 16, which was doubled when compared to the unmodified device. The pressure sensitivity can reach 0.00788 ± 0.00041 kPa−1, demonstrating excellent durability and outstanding stability (over 5000 cycles). The prepared sensor demonstrated exceptional monitoring capability of faint pulse characteristic waves, which contributed to a thorough understanding of the piezoresistive response performance of human health monitoring sensors and the optimization design of microstructures in advanced CCF/PDMS composite materials.