Ultrasensitive Flexible Thermal Sensor Arrays based on High‐Thermopower Ionic Thermoelectric Hydrogel

Abstract

Abstract Ionic circuits using ions as charge carriers have demonstrated great potential for flexible and bioinspired electronics. The emerging ionic thermoelectric (iTE) materials can generate a potential difference by virtue of selective thermal diffusion of ions, which provide a new route for thermal sensing with the merits of high flexibility, low cost, and high thermopower. Here, ultrasensitive flexible thermal sensor arrays based on an iTE hydrogel consisting of polyquaternium‐10 (PQ‐10), a cellulose derivative, as the polymer matrix and sodium hydroxide (NaOH) as the ion source are reported. The developed PQ‐10/NaOH iTE hydrogel achieves a thermopower of 24.17 mV K−1, which is among the highest values reported for biopolymer‐based iTE materials. The high p‐type thermopower can be attributed to thermodiffusion of Na+ ions under a temperature gradient, while the movement of OH− ions is impeded by the strong electrostatic interaction with the positively charged quaternary amine groups of PQ‐10. Flexible thermal sensor arrays are developed through patterning the PQ‐10/NaOH iTE hydrogel on flexible printed circuit boards, which can perceive spatial thermal signals with high sensitivity. A smart glove integrated with multiple thermal sensor arrays is further demonstrated, which endows a prosthetic hand with thermal sensation for human–machine interaction.

Keywords

• flexible thermal sensor array
• ionic thermoelectric hydrogel
• polyquaternium‐10
• Soret effect
• thermopower