Care for an extra skin?

Think about using your skin as an interface for your devices. Your phone starts vibrating in your pocket or purse during a meeting and you decide to stop the incoming call by clicking on … your finger!
This is what researchers at Saarland University are proposing by developing an electronic skin that can be overlaid on your own skin. Curious? Look at the video clip.
They called their invention iSkin. It is made of flexible stretchable silicon that looks like a sticker. It consists of three layers that provide the sensing capability. It can actually distinguish between a light touch and a stronger one, thus coding potentially 2 messages. Several sensors can be placed on a single sticker and one can even choose the shape and the look of the stickers so that they resemble sort of tattoo. They stick on the skin using a biocompatible medical-grade adhesive.
According to researchers you will be able to interact with a variety of devices, including your mobile phone but also with your television set, it will be like having a remote control on your arm, hand, fingers.
There is a catch though. So far you need a wire to connect the sensor(s) to a device that will radio transmit the signals. This is not handy at all. However the researchers are working to embed a transmission chip in the sticker so that you don’t need anything extra. It won’t come soon, at least this is my bet. Once you have a chip embedded (not difficult) you’ll need a battery to operate it. This is not convenient. A few years down the lane we might be able to harvest energy locally (by scavenging the temperature differential between your skin and the surrounding air, as an example) but this will take time. The power needed to operate the sensors and the chip is not that much but the one needed for radio transmitting the signal is beyond currently scavenging technology.
So for the time being I don’t see this iSkin making an in-road on our skin. Possibly it can be used as an add on to our ski-jacket where it won’t be inconvenient to have a battery somewhere ….

About Roberto Saracco

Roberto Saracco fell in love with technology and its implications long time ago. His background is in math and computer science. Until April 2017 he led the EIT Digital Italian Node and then was head of the Industrial Doctoral School of EIT Digital up to September 2018. Previously, up to December 2011 he was the Director of the Telecom Italia Future Centre in Venice, looking at the interplay of technology evolution, economics and society. At the turn of the century he led a World Bank-Infodev project to stimulate entrepreneurship in Latin America. He is a senior member of IEEE where he leads the New Initiative Committee and co-chairs the Digital Reality Initiative. He is a member of the IEEE in 2050 Ad Hoc Committee. He teaches a Master course on Technology Forecasting and Market impact at the University of Trento. He has published over 100 papers in journals and magazines and 14 books.