A Stereoscopically Structured Triboelectric Nanogenerator for Bending Sensors and Hierarchical Interactive Systems

Wearable interactive technology has attracted extensive research interests for future intelligent life. The fast development of the Internet of Things (IoTs) also raises urgent demands on human–machine interaction techniques to provide a direct correlation between human orders and machine operation. Here, we design a series of stereoscopic structured triboelectric nanogenerator (SS-TENG) sensors to be worn on the fingers as a wearable human–robot interactive system. The SS-TENG sensor is designed into a grating-structured TENG (G-TENG) terminally connected with two flap-structured TENGs (F-TENGs). The G-TENG sensor can quantify the bending angle of human finger (minimum resolution of 4.1°) by counting the number of triboelectric signals, while the F-TENG can indicate the bending and holding state of the fingers. Based on the wearable SS-TENG, a manipulator synchronous control system is established to control a robot hand. By counting the number of triboelectric pulses or the positive/negative peaks, an intuitive mapping between the human hand and the manipulator is established. Benefiting from the stereoscopic design, there is plenty of room surrounding the conventional planar TENG device that can be fully utilized to implement more sophisticated triboelectric sensing or interactive applications.