Research on bio-inspired E-skin for artificial nerve system

Abstract

Since the emerging of the 4th industrial revolution, research on electronic skin (E-skin) has been widely explored as a key element for realizing the internet of things-based hyper-connected society. E-skin which mimics the sensory recognition ability of natural consist of various sensors that can detect external stimuli such as pressure, temperature, and light. Especially, advanced multi-functional or flexible e-skin has attracted huge interest for its capability of being adopted in user interfaces for interacting human-machine systems, immersive displays, humanoid robots, and health care applications in contrast to conventional rigid single sensor technology. Various studies such as materials, structure, and process have been reported to realize the e-skin, but materials and processes with high compatibility with conventional semiconductor process required for large area mass production are still remaining as a challenge. In this study, we fabricated an artificial nerve system that mimics the mechanoreceptor in human skin that can be operated with low power and is suitable for high density integration by utilizing the piezoelectric properties of hafnia. Especially in the consideration of applications to vertically stacked high-density integration and flexible devices, a high-pressure electromagnetic wave induction annealing process was developed to solve the problem of high-temperature annealing required to form a specific crystal phase for the piezoelectric films. Since this hafnia piezoelectric-based artificial nerve system can be applied to semiconductor process-compatible e-skin and low-temperature process-based flexible electronics, we expect this approach to be applied to various industrial fields.