Chengyi Xu, Ph.D., an assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical and Materials Engineering, was recently awarded a $10,000 Faculty Development Grant Program (FDGP) award to fund his research into soft-sensor technologies with enhanced awareness in complex environments. The project, which will run from May 2025 until August 2026, will explore technology that could improve human and robot status monitoring through the development of soft, skin-like pressure sensors.
Currently, applications in a wide range of industries utilize silicon-based pressure sensors. These can be found in such fields as automotive safety, human-machine interfaces, bionic prosthetics, health monitoring, and advanced robotics. These sensors, though highly sensitive, are rigid and bulky, and their rigidity can lead to poor signal quality and limited adaptability to irregular surfaces.
“Conventional pressure sensors are flexible, but even sensors made with plastic substrates still use materials that are far stiffer than biological tissues,” Xu explains. “Through my research, I hope to demonstrate that soft capacitive pressure sensors, with skin-like modulus and improved conformability, offer a promising alternative.”
To create this type of sensor, Xu says researchers must overcome three key challenges:
- decoupling complex mechanical stimuli,
- achieving high sensitivity across a broad dynamic range, and
- ensuring linear responses.
“In this project, we leverage our expertise in soft materials, mechanical design, and digital manufacturing to develop soft capacitive sensors that address these challenges,” Xu says. “The proposed skin-like sensors will enable dynamic monitoring of human and robotic status with unprecedented accuracy and adaptability.”
Xu was selected for the FDGP award by a panel composed of members of the Research and Faculty Development Committees of the UAB Faculty Senate, including faculty members from more than 19 schools and departments.
For more on Xu’s research, visit the X-Lab website.