A new form of artificial skin, threaded with a network of artificial sensors, could recreate the sense of touch for people wearing prosthetic limbs, researchers revealed on Tuesday.
据美国《时代周刊》报道，研究人员12月9日透露，一种植入传感器网络的新型人造皮肤能让戴假肢的人重获感知体验。
Researchers in Korea and the U.S.have developed a new form of ultra-thin sensors that can pick up sensations of heat, pressure and moisture, MIT Technology Review reports. The sensors are malleable enough to be woven into a thin layer of polymer. The breakthrough, researchers say, came when they packed the skin with enough sensors, up to 400 per square millimeter, to recreate the sensations of human touch.
据美国《麻省理工科技评论》杂志（MIT Technology Review）报道，韩国和美国的研究人员研发出了一种超薄型传感器，能感知外界的温度、压力和湿度。这种传感器有足够的柔韧性，能被植入一层超薄的高分 子聚合物。研究者表示，这种高分子聚合物材质的突破性进展在于，其每平方毫米的传感器数量高达400个，足够让假肢获得真实的感知体验。
“If you have these sensors at high resolution across the finger, you can give the same tactile touch that the normal hand would convey to the brain,” said contributing researcher Roozbeh Ghaffari.
该项目研究人员鲁兹贝·加法里（Roozbeh Ghaffari）说：“如果手指假肢能够配置拥有如此高分辨率的传感器皮肤，大脑就可以接收到与正常手指几乎相同的触觉反馈。”
Still, they cautioned that the skin was still several breakthroughs away from becoming a commercial product. Most crucially, scientists need to puzzle out better ways of wiring the skin into the wearer’s nervous system, so that no feeling is lost as the skin transmits its finely tuned signals to the brain.
然而，研究人员谨慎表示，要想成为商业产品，这款人造皮肤还需解决几个问题。当务之急，就是科学家们必须找到连接传感器和神经系统的更好途径，建立持续稳定的连接，让大脑真正获得完全对应的感知体验。