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Self-Healable Sensors Based Nanoparticles for Detecting Physiological Markers via Skin and Breath: Toward Disease Prevention via Wearable Devices
journal contribution
posted on 2016-06-21, 00:00 authored by Han Jin, Tan-Phat Huynh, Hossam HaickFlexible and wearable electronic
sensors are useful for the early diagnosis and monitoring of an individual’s
health state. Sampling of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) derived
from human breath/skin or monitoring abrupt changes in heart-beat/breath
rate should allow noninvasive monitoring of disease states at an early
stage. Nevertheless, for many reported wearable sensing devices, interaction
with the human body leads incidentally to unavoidable scratches and/or
mechanical cuts and bring about malfunction of these devices. We now
offer proof-of-concept of nanoparticle-based flexible sensor arrays
with fascinating self-healing abilities. By integrating a self-healable
polymer substrate with 5 kinds of functionalized gold nanoparticle
films, a sensor array gives a fast self-healing (<3 h) and attractive
healing efficiency in both the substrate and sensing films. The proposed
platform was used in sensing pressure variation and 11 kinds of VOCs.
The sensor array had satisfactory sensitivity, a low detection limit,
and promising discrimination features in monitoring both of VOCs and
pressure variation, even after full healing. These results presage
a new type of smart sensing device, with a desirable performance in
the possible detection and/or clinical application for a number of
different purposes.