Wearable graphene sensors on adhesive tapes

Abstract

We report a simple, reliable, and cost-effective method of fabricating wearable graphene-based physical sensors on adhesive tapes for detecting mechanical signals, such as pressure, force, and strain. The device fabrication mainly involves two steps, including patterning graphene by repeated “sticking and peeling off” processes with scotch tapes, and then transferring the patterned graphene to another adhesive tape. Once a reusable mold is formed by soft lithography, no further film deposition, lithography or etching processes are required to obtain graphene-based wearable sensors. We demonstrate using the strain and pressure sensors made on polyimide tapes to track body motion, as well as monitor pressure applied to a flexible object.