An 8-Micrometer-Thick Film Strain Sensor with Conformal 3D Microstructure for Accurate Detection of Body Motion and Air Leakage

Elastomer-based resistive super-thin film strain sensors show great application potentials in electronic skins, human–machine interaction systems, wearable devices for healthcare, and machine learning algorithms. However, it is challenging to accurately monitor the deformation of human body joints and organs with curved surfaces (e.g., knees, throats, finger joints) by only taking advantage of material thickness and elasticity of conventional 2D film strain sensors. Herein, a simple strategy is developed to fabricate conformal elastomeric thin film sensors with periodic 3D microstructure inspired by the ridges and valleys of human skin for accurate signal acquisition. Specifically, an 8-micrometer-thick elastic film strain sensor with 3D microstructure is fabricated via thermoforming followed by in situ chemical growth of silver nanoparticles. The 3D film strain sensors exhibit excellent signal linearity (R 2 = 0.99) and relatively high sensitivity (gauge factor = 14) over a relatively wide strain range (≈43%), with an ultra-low strain detection limit of 0.025%, enabling potential applications in human healthcare monitoring and air leakage detection. Thus, this study unveils a simple methodology to process microstructure-enabled conformable 3D film strain sensors, which show good conformability and multiple mechanical sensing functions for advancing the development of next-generation flexible strain sensors.