Soft and stretchable material shows multi-role potential

Their approach employs a process that eliminates many drawbacks of previous fabrication methods, such as less conductivity or device failure, the team said. Their findings have been published in Advanced Materials.   

In a statement, Penn State Assistant Professor Tao Zhou said: “People have been developing soft and stretchable conductors for almost a decade, but the conductivity is not usually very high.

“Researchers realised they could reach high conductivity with liquid metal-based conductors, but the significant limitation of that is that it requires a secondary method to activate the material before it can reach a high conductivity.” 

Liquid metal-based stretchable conductors suffer from inherent complexity and challenges posed by the post-fabrication activation process, the researchers said.

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Secondary activation methods include stretching, compressing, shear friction, mechanical sintering and laser activation, all of which can lead to challenges in fabrication and can cause the liquid metal to leak, resulting in device failure.