Lamprey Teeth-Inspired Flexible Tactile Sensors with High Sensitivity and a Wide Linear Range

Flexible tactile sensors (FTS) can be integrated into various parts of the human body to achieve physiological signal detection and sensitive tactile perception. The microstructure design effectively improves the change rate of the contact area at the contact interface and achieves high sensitivity and a wide detection range of FTS. However, the attenuation of sensitivity with increasing pressure is yet to be fully resolved. Herein, inspired by the oriented arrangement of lamprey teeth, an FTS (noted as FTSC) with high-pressure sensitivity (60.38 kPa–1), linear response (R2 = 0.998) over a broad pressure range (10 Pa–200 kPa), and high stability over 5000 cycles is designed. The strategy of cooperative stress transfer of concentric rows of an inwardly curved barb array (CBA) mitigates the saturation rate of the contact area in the high-pressure region, resulting in high sensitivity over a wide linear range. Furthermore, the great application potential of the FTSC in healthcare monitoring and information interaction is demonstrated. This work not only advances the sensing performance of tactile sensors but also provides a promising strategy for developing next-generation soft electronics.