Flexible Electrodes for Smart Bandages: Feasibility Exploration

Abstract

Flexible electrodes are revolutionizing the field of wearable health-monitoring and therapeutic devices by enabling the production of large, lightweight, and thin gadgets. These electrodes are incredibly beneficial for collecting bioelectric signals from the human body. They offer stable, high-quality signals while ensuring breathability and skin-friendly contact. Products for which flexible electrodes are actively being developed include innovative wearable devices, portable medical equipment, and brain-computer interfaces.

Wearable medical devices necessitate the integration of electrodes, power sources, and microcontroller chips. Flexible electrodes offer several advantages, namely, flexibility, comfort, biocompatibility, and superior signal quality. Flexible electrodes made using conductive ink and a polyurethane film with an adhesive layer are capable of long-term monitoring while maintaining high signal quality.

The primary objective of this study is to refine the design of flexible electrodes used in wearable health-monitoring and therapeutic devices. By fabricating micro-perforated structures with various aperture sizes and spacings and applying silver ink on Z-conductive electrodes, the aim is to identify the optimal combination of aperture size and spacing. To this end, a measuring and fitting process is employed. We discovered that Z-conductive electrodes with a hole spacing of 0.28 mm exhibited the lowest impedance values in the low-frequency range of 5 kHz-50 kHz. Comparatively, holes with a spacing of 0.4 mm had the lowest impedance in the high-frequency range of 100-500 kHz. These findings may facilitate future mass production efforts for our industrial partner, Ti2 Pty Ltd. This research contributes to innovation in wearable medical technologies by enhancing the performance of flexible electrodes, thereby improving the quality of biometric signal collection and the comfortability of wearable devices.