*Pressure sensitive robotic skins have long been investigated for applications in physical human-robot interaction (pHRI). Numerous challenges related to fabrication, sensitivity, density, and reliability under various environmental conditions remain. In our previous studies, we designed different novel strain gauge structures for robotic skin arrays. We coated these star-shaped designs with an organic polymer piezoresistive material, Poly (3, 4-ethylenedioxythiophene)-ploy(styrenesulfonate) or PEDOT: PSS and integrated such sensor arrays into robotic skins. In this paper, we describe a dry etching photolithographic method to create a stable uniform sensor layer of PEDOT: PSS onto star-shaped structure sensors and a lamination process for double-sided robotic skin that can be used in temperature compensation. An integrated circuit and load testing apparatus was designed for testing the resulting robotic skin sensor pressure performance. Experiments were conducted to measure the loading performance of the resulting sensor prototype and results indicate that over 80% sensor yields are possible with this process.*


Organic Piezoresistive Pressure Sensitive Robotic Skin for Physical Human-Robot Interaction

Division / Sponsors: 
Design Engineering Division and Computers & Information In Engineering Division


Paper Proceedings: https://asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/IDETC-CIE/IDETC-CIE2020/volume/83907

IDETC2020 - Virtual Conference

Supporting the need among researchers worldwide for additional online and multimedia content, ASME now offers the ASME Conference Video Collection. This platform will collect and provide long-term access to conference presentation videos, encompassing all technology areas within ASME's technical conference and events program. About 30,000-40,000 engineers across all mechanical engineering and related disciplines participate in ASME conferences each year. This includes authors of approximately 6,000 to 8,000 technical papers published by ASME, the majority of whom also submit video presentations for our virtual conferences. The video collection will be available as an add-on to existing product packages or as a separate subscription.