3D Printing of Liquid Metal Based Tactile Sensor for Simultaneously Sensing of Temperature and Forces

ABSTRACT Tactile sensors have been used for haptic perception in intelligent robotics, smart prosthetics, and human-machine interface. The development of multifunctional tactile sensor remains a challenge and limit its application in flexible electronics and devices. We propose a liquid metal based tactile sensor for both temperature and force sensing which is made by 3D printing. The structural design and working principle of liquid metal based tactile sensor are firstly described. A digital light processing-based printing process is developed to print two kinds of photosensitive resins with different hardness, and used to fabricate the tactile sensor. A Wheatstone bridge circuit is designed for decoupling the temperature and forces from the measured output voltages. Characterization tests show that the tactile sensor has relatively high force sensing sensitivity of 0.29 N-1, and temperature sensing sensitivities are 0.55% °C−1 at 20 ~ 50 °C and 0.21% °C−1 at 50 ~ 80 °C, respectively. Then, the fabricated tactile sensor is mounted onto hand finger to measure the contact force and temperature during grasping. Results show that the 3D printed tactile sensor has excellent flexibility and durability and can accurately measure the temperature and contact forces, which demonstrate its potential in robotic manipulation applications. Graphical Abstract