Stretchable, foldable conductive material developed by researchers opens new biometrics possibilities
Researchers at Texas A&M’s College of Engineering have developed a conductive coating that can maintain performance even when heavily stretched and bent, potentially enabling a range of biometric and wearable technologies, Phys.org reports.
The challenge of finding a material which retains electrical conductivity while being stretched, folded, or twisted is critical to the development of emerging technologies including adaptive displays, artificial skin, biometrics and wearable devices. The material must also be able to be engineered into surfaces such as cloth, fiber, glass, or plastic, according to Phys.org.
A new conductive coating which can withstand a wide variety of deformations has been developed by a team from the Artie McFerrin Department of Chemical Engineering and the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, led by Dr. Jodie Lutkenhaus, as associate professor and holder of the William and Ruth Neely Faculty Fellowship.
The researchers used two-dimensional metal carbides (MXenes), which have previously been used as sheets, to create conductive multilayer MXenes coatings by using an aqueous assembly process called layer-by-layer assembly. The team has applied the coatings to flexible polymer sheets, stretchable silicones, nylon fiber, glass, and silicon.
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