Wearable Synaptic Transistors

Both wearable and neuromorphic applications have been on the rise this decade. However, a classical evolutionary approach was to take existing solutions and re-shape them into a wearable form factor. In contrast, graphene has shown a revolutionary advantage to wearables as well as neuromorphic devices. This work shows a unique solution that allows the skin as the synaptic bio-input with the vision to create advanced neuromorphic sensing and self-aware stand-alone “smart” bioelectronic systems.
Leveraging our recent concept of graphene-based soft, flexible, and power-efficient neuromorphic transistors (BLASTs), we extended them into skinBLASTs, arranging the graphene-Nafion structure into the wearable and skin-conformal format. The performance of such devices is astonishing: the porcine-based network performs close to ideal, with a more significant performance degradation seen in the human-based network. These neuromorphic bioelectronic tattoos have the potential for developing self-aware and stand-alone smart wearables, crucial for understanding and improving overall human performance.
Finally, we show that interbody neuromorphic communication is possible by employing the flexible neuromorphic tattoos that are controlled through the skin, opening unique routes for advanced in-body neuromorphic computing systems.