Personalized Kirigami Strain Sensors for in vivo Applications

Abstract

Wearable sensors are transforming our capacity to monitor a broad range of activities for recreation and health purposes. Developing low-cost personalized sensors on a range of materials could enable broad applicability irrespective of the material substrate. Here, the methods of fabrication, characterization, and application of kirigami graphene strain sensors are described. The dynamic range of these sensors is characterized, showing that the kirigami structure enhances application-specific device performance, demonstrating that this strategy is applicable to a range of materials. We apply this strategy to develop personalized sensors for a variety of measurement frequencies and biological phenomena including evaluation of abdominal distention and respiration in a pig model, as well as human heart rate measurement, limb actuation, and hand gesture interpretation in human volunteers. Through these experiments, we show that this low-cost strategy for customized graphene sensors can be broadly applied across a range of consumer and health applications.