High aspect-ratio deflection transducers inspired by the ultra-sensitive cantilever configuration of scorpion trichobothria

Ultra-sensitive cantilever transducers are always considered as a platform for the next generation of physical, chemical and biological sensors. However, it is still a big challenge to design artificial ultra-sensitive cantilever transducers especially for using simple method and with simple structure and materials. Scorpion, a visual degeneration animal, can sense extremely small air flow only using the simple cantilever-like trichobothria on its pedipalp. It can transduce micro airflow signals into deflection instead of bending. It was shown that the detecting configuration of scorpion’s trichobothria is mainly made up of two parts, the low-aspect-ratio elastic tissue and the high-aspect-ratio rigid hair shaft. More importantly, the aspect-ratio and the stiffness of the rigid hair shaft are extremely larger than that of the elastic tissue part. This specials material and structure characteristics can achieve a high aspect-ratio for the cantilever. Inspired by this principle, a kind of deflection transducers with high aspect-ratio is designed in this work. The results confirm that it can also catch the stimulus signals by deflection, showing ultra-sensitive characteristics. This kind of transducer is higher sensitivity, easy fabrication and less cost. So, it is expected that this kind of new bioinspired sensor can be applied well in many important engineering fields.