Design and Output Characteristics of Carbon Nanotube-Silicone Rubber Based Piezoresistive Tactile Sensors
摘要
Inspired by the tactile perception mechanism of human fingertips, an array flexible piezoresistive tactile sensor composed of carbon nanotube particles and silicone rubber was designed and fabricated, which has both strong flexibility and high sensitivity. The sensor comprises a pressure-sensitive conductive film, an array flexible printed circuit board, an organosilicon elastic substrate and a post-processing circuit. The flexible tactile sensor circuit board is embedded in the grooves on the silicone elastic substrate, and the pressure-sensitive conductive film is covered on the flexible tactile sensor circuit board. The flexible printed circuit board is an array of 3 × 3 comb sensing units. The pressure-sensitive conductive film consists of a carbon film and nine hemispherical conductive contacts distributed on the carbon film. Each comb sensing unit corresponds to a hemispherical conductive contact. The post-processing circuit converts pressure into an electrical signal by using the principle of voltage division. The force measurement range of the sensor is 0.1 N to 10 N. The pressure and output voltage basically change in a piecewise linear manner. As the pressure increases, the rate of voltage change decreases. This sensor can effectively detect the magnitude and direction of three-dimensional forces.