skinsensing

Skin sensing, sometimes written as skinsensing, refers to the ability to detect and interpret stimuli through the skin. In biology, the skin hosts specialized receptors that transduce mechanical, thermal, and chemical stimuli into electrical signals. The tactile system responds to pressure, vibration, and texture; the cutaneous thermosensory system detects warmth and cold; nociception signals potentially damaging stimuli.

Receptors and pathways: Mechanoreceptors in the skin include Merkel discs, Meissner corpuscles, Ruffini endings, and Pacinian corpuscles. Different nerve fiber types, such as Aβ for fine touch and Aδ/C for pain and temperature, convey signals to the spinal cord and thalamus, then to the somatosensory cortex. This pathway supports conscious touch, proprioception, and protective responses, and it interacts with other senses to form an integrated sense of body state.

Skin sensing in technology: Artificial skin or e-skin refers to flexible sensor arrays that imitate skin’s tactile function. Sensor types include capacitive, piezoresistive, piezoelectric, triboelectric, optical, and chemical modalities. These skins are used to equip robots and prosthetics with large-area, high-resolution, and stretchable sensing capabilities, enabling more delicate manipulation and richer human–machine interaction. Wearable health devices also rely on skin-like sensing for continuous monitoring.

Challenges and outlook: Key issues involve durability under repetitive deformation, waterproofing, biocompatibility for implanted systems, power efficiency, and real-time data processing. Calibrating and integrating diverse sensor signals remain active research areas, along with developing standardized metrics to compare performance across biological and artificial skins.