12. Skin Electronics

Research

Electronic skin refers to flexible, stretchable and self-healing electronics that are able to mimic functionalities of human or animal skin. The broad class of materials often contain sensing abilities that are intended to reproduce the capabilities of human skin to respond to environmental factors such as changes in heat and pressure.

Advances in electronic skin research focuses on designing materials that are stretchy, robust, and flexible. Research in the individual fields of flexible electronics and tactile sensing has progressed greatly; however, electronic skin design attempts to bring together advances in many areas of materials research without sacrificing individual benefits from each field.[5] The successful combination of flexible and stretchable mechanical properties with sensors and the ability to self-heal would open the door to many possible applications including soft robotics, prosthetics, artificial intelligence and health monitoring.

Recent advances in the field of electronic skin have focused on incorporating green materials ideals and environmental awareness into the design process. (Wikipedia)

Applications

Health monitoring E-skin can be used to monitor vital signs, such as heart rate, blood pressure, and hydration. Medical treatment E-skin can be used in medical implants and to help treat patients with COVID-19.

Robotics E-skin can be used to give robots a sense of touch, allowing them to interact with humans more intelligently.

Human-machine interfaces E-skin can be used to create interfaces between humans and machines. Virtual and augmented reality E-skin can be used to create more immersive virtual and augmented reality experiences.

Challenges E-skin can be expensive to make. E-skin can be difficult to fabricate. Electronic components are often brittle and inflexible, while human skin is malleable.

weekly assignment

1. Document the concept, sketches, references also to artistic and scientific publications
2. Design a “skin-circuit”, exploring the replication of the examples bwlow or: the Skin masquerade party project the Twinkle Nails project interactive tattoo
3. Explore how to create a new skin electronics accessory.
4. Document the project and included all source files and all materials used
5. Upload your design files and source code
6. Make a video with your skin electronic working
7. Make a short performance/concept of your project functioning (extra credit)

get inspired!

• Skin Circuit - Grecia Bello - Fab Lab BCN

• Interactive glove - Asli Aksan - Textile Lab Amsterdam

• Face Mask - Riley Cox - Textile Lab Amsterdam

• Skin electronics research - Julija Karas - Fab Lab BCN

References & Inspiration

"Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum."

• Two images side-by-side

Tools

• Arduino UNO
• Arduino IDE

Process and workflow

My sketches are ...

This schematic ¹ was obtained by..

This tutorial ² was created using..

footnote fabrication files

Fabrication files are a necessary element for evaluation. You can add the fabrication files at the bottom of the page and simply link them as a footnote. This was your work stays organised and files will be all together at the bottom of the page. Footnotes are created using [ ^ 1 ] (without spaces, and referenced as you see at the last chapter of this page) You can reference the fabrication files to multiple places on your page as you see for footnote nr. 2 also present in the Gallery.

Code Example

Use the three backticks to separate code.

// the setup function runs once when you press reset or power the board
void setup() {
  // initialize digital pin LED_BUILTIN as an output.
  pinMode(LED_BUILTIN, OUTPUT);
}

// the loop function runs over and over again forever
void loop() {
  digitalWrite(LED_BUILTIN, HIGH);   // turn the LED on (HIGH is the voltage level)
  delay(1000);                       // wait for a second
  digitalWrite(LED_BUILTIN, LOW);    // turn the LED off by making the voltage LOW
  delay(1000);                       // wait for a second
}

Results

Video

From Vimeo

Sound Waves from George Gally (Radarboy) on Vimeo.

From Youtube

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Fabrication files

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1. File: xxx ↩

2. File: xxx ↩