Abstract
The development of advanced, human like tactile sensing capabilities is one of the key challenges for next generation robots or prosthetics. Tactile sensors arrays will need to exhibit the desired sensing capabilities, show robustness to external influences as well as good approaches for the integration of large amounts of sensors. We present a tactile sensor array technology, based on the fabrication of a flexible interconnection substrate containing directly integrated tactile sensors. This approach has several advantages: interconnection substrate technology is widely available making upscaling of sensor arrays easy to a large amount of sensors and/or large sensing areas, the direct integration of sensors allows for a simple and very compact approach to densely packed sensor arrays and the structured flexible substrate enables integration into complex, three-dimensional bodies. We present sensors with a size of <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$600~\mu \text{m}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> and arrays of up to <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$12\times12$ </tex-math></inline-formula> individually addressable sensors. The sensors have a wide measurement range; free membrane deformation results in a high sensitivity of 2.6 kPa <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">−1</sup> respectively 2600 N <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">−1</sup> for small applied pressures (0–0.6 kPa) whereas deforming polymer studs extend the measurement range for larger applied pressures (5–25 kPa) with a sensitivity of 0.022 kPa <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">−1</sup> respectively 22 N <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">−1</sup> . A statistical study of six sensor arrays from three wafers showed repeatable performance of the fabricated structures and robustness tests proved the stable sensing conditions over 10’000 cycles. [2021-0072]
Highlights
T ACTILE sensing is a very active field of research aiming at achieving, or even surpassing, human like touch sensing capabilities for generation robots or prosthetics
The first picture shows a segment of the fabricated sensor arrays of membrane type M1, the second picture is a close-up of one sensor with membrane type M3
We developed a new capacitive sensor array technology for distributed sensing on a flexible substrate
Summary
T ACTILE sensing is a very active field of research aiming at achieving, or even surpassing, human like touch sensing capabilities for generation robots or prosthetics. The field has to overcome several key challenges. Tactile sensor arrays will need to achieve the desired sensing capabilities: 1) sufficient range for touch detection (1 – 10 kPa), 2) spatial resolution of about one sensor per square millimeters well as 3) the capability to resolve higher frequencies of up to 500 Hz for vibration sensing [1]–[3]. The sensing technology has to be robust, meaning. Manuscript received April 6, 2021; revised July 5, 2021; accepted August 9, 2021. Date of publication September 22, 2021; date of current version November 30, 2021.
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