A skin-inspired, self-powered tactile sensor

Self-powered pressure- and temperature-sensing abilities are essential for the skin-inspired tactile perception ability of artificial electronic skins (e-skins). Recent research on e-skins has focused on simultaneous detection of pressure and temperature with a single device, whereas sensor operation without energy consumption remains a challenge. For genuine skin-like extrasensory perception, this study demonstrates a self-powered multifunctional ionic tactile sensor (SMITS) through lamination of a single-electrode triboelectric nanogenerator (SETENG) and a capacitive ionic sensor (CIS) sharing a common electrode. For this new type of electronic mechanoreceptor, a single touch not only enables identification of the kind of material but also electrifies the CIS, with the voltage varying under different pressures from 0 to 60 kPa and temperatures from 25° to 45°C without any additional energy supply.