Bio-inspired, Micro-structured Silk Fibroin Adhesives for Flexible Skin Sensors.

Wearable epidermal sensors are of great importance to the next generation personalized healthcare. The adhesion between the flexible sensor and skin surface is critical for obtaining accurate, reliable and stable signals. Herein we present a facile approach to fabricate a micro-structured, natural silk fibroin protein based adhesive for achieving highly conformal, comfortable, adjustable, and biocompatible adhesion on the skin surface. The micro-structured fibroin adhesive (MSFA) exhibits reliable and stable bonding force on skin surfaces, even under humid or wet conditions, and can be easily peeled off from the skin without causing significant pain. Such MSFA can greatly improve the sensitivity and reusability of epidermal strain sensors due to its conformal and tunable adhesion on skin surfaces. The MFSA has a great potential to be applied as functional adhesives for various epidermal electronic sensors in the era of personalized healthcare.