Skin is the biggest protective organ of human body, and the mystery of its formation attracts many scientists. Scientists all hope to study the skin most similar to human beings for artificial intelligence, so that robots can have more realistic effects. Israeli scientists have developed a flexible polymer material that can heal itself when it suffers external injuries, such as scratches, cuts and sprains. If this material is combined with sensors, flexible electronics skin with self-repairing ability is expected to be obtained, and flexible electronics skin is expected to have a very broad application field in the future, which can be applied to robot research, artificial limbs, wearable devices and so on.

This flexible polymer material was developed by the School of Chemical Engineering, Israel Polytechnic University, and developed by Hos Sam? Under the guidance of Professor Hayek, the current progress is to study how to integrate advanced sensors into the electronic skin of elastomers, which Bill and Melinda have been studying. With the support of the Gates Foundation, the current research results have been published in advanced materials and other magazines.

Mammalian skin is indispensable in the process of individual growth, development and survival. It is a barrier against a series of biological and physical factors, such as external pathogenic microorganisms, and helps us maintain a basically stable state in a world where bacteria are everywhere. Moreover, the skin is also a huge perception platform, which is highly sensitive to environmental stimuli and can help the body quickly respond to environmental changes. Therefore, if flexible electronics skin is successfully developed, its future use value will be immeasurable.

Researchers at Israel Institute of Technology also said that their decision to develop this self-repair system similar to human skin was also inspired by the biological repair process of human skin. First of all, we need to develop a unique elastomer, whose unique characteristics include self-healing in various pH environments, and then we need to further improve the waterproof performance so that it can prevent leakage and self-repair when it encounters mechanical damage in water.

Then, the electronic skin was developed by using this elastomer, and various functions such as selective perception, self-monitoring and self-repair mechanism were integrated into the electronic skin, so that the electronic skin could detect environmental changes, thus monitoring the original damaged parts and accelerating the repair of damaged parts. At present, scientists are vigorously developing artificial electronic materials and equipment similar to animal skin characteristics. After all, in the field of robotics, R&D personnel not only pursue performance, but also pursue effect and fidelity. Do you think that after the successful development of this electronic skin, future robots will completely imitate humans?