Are the life-nauts of Japan and DARPA's war robots getting their artificial skin that can feel and heal itself? Are these robots our future Martians?
The artificial skin that can feel and heal itself
- Material is the first be able to heal itself, and also sense subtle pressure
- After being cut with a scalpel, it heals close to 100% with 30 minutes
Scientists have invented the first artificial skin that can both sense subtle pressure and heal itself when torn or cut – and could one day be used for the screens on mobile phones.
A team from Stanford University are the first to create a synthetic skin that can not only repair damage to itself but is also able, crucially, to conduct electricity.
It is this crucial latter property that promises to make it useful in the field of consumer electronics.
One of the major bugbears smartphone users have had, particularly the iPhone, was propensity of the screen on the devices to smash when dropped.
A transparent, healable polymer that can sense pressure could be invaluable for making future generations of devices more resilient to breakages.
In the past decade, there have been major advances in synthetic skin, said Professor Zhenan Bao, the study’s principal investigator. But even the most effective self-healing materials had major drawbacks.
Some had to be exposed to high temperatures, making them impractical for day-to-day use. Others could heal at room temperature, but repairing a cut changed their mechanical or chemical structure, so they could only heal themselves once.
Most importantly, no self-healing material was a good bulk conductor of electricity, a crucial property.
‘To interface this kind of material with the digital world, ideally you want them to be conductive,’ said Benjamin Chee-Keong Tee, first author of the paper published yesterday in the journal Nature Nanotechnology.
