Artificial Skin Could Soon Give Sense of Touch to Artificial Limbs

A new "organic electronic skin" was developed with hopes of giving a sense of touch to artificial or prosthetic limbs.

According to the report published at Science Mag Journal, the researchers led by Prof. Zhenan Bao of Stanford University in California has developed a skin-like "mechanoreceptors" integrated with "organic transistor circuit" that transforms pressure into digital signals sent directly to the brain.

This work represents a step toward the design and use of large-area organic electronic skins with neural-integrated touch feedback for replacement limbs," the researchers pointed in the report.

In a report by Medical News Today (MNT), the team of engineers used a two-layered plastic component where the top layer serves as a sensor that distinguishes pressure just like what the human skin does. Meanwhile, the second layer acts as the "circuit" that will convert the pressure into electric signals which were then sent to the nerve cells to the brain.

As mention by the report, in order to do this, the researchers used "carbon nanotubes" in the plastic component that enabled it to "conduct electricity." Through this, the flexible material was able to act like a skin, transmitting "short electric pulses."

The researchers tested the plastic material by creating a model of a line of neurons that were found in a human's nervous system. Through converting pressure signals to light pulses, the researchers discovered that the neurons and their skin-like plastic material could create a "sensory output" that is recognizable and communicable to the nerve cells.

"The sensor successfully converted pressure into a digital response in a pressure range comparable to that found in a human grip," the researchers furthered in their study.

On the other hand, although the material is still on trial stage and there are still a lot of works to do, the researchers shared that they will be improving what they created and will look into developing a sensor that will enhance the sensing ability of artificial limbs.

"We have a lot of work to take this from experimental to practical applications. But after spending many years in this work, I now see a clear path where we can take our artificial skin," Prof. Bao told MNT.

This new material could very well help those people who have lost their limbs due to various incidents. As reported by the Amputee Coalition, there are roughly two million people in the United States that suffer with the loss of limbs. Making this worse is that there are 185,000 amputations happening in US every year.