Highly flexible and transparent amorphous indium doped tin oxide on bio-compatible polymers for transparent wearable sensors

Highly transparent and flexible amorphous Sn-doped In₂O₃ (a-ITO) films deposited on flexible and bio-compatible cyclic olefin polymer (COP) substrate using a direct-current magnetron sputtering at room temperature were used as flexible and transparent electrodes for transparent wearable sensors. The figure of merits (FoM) value was calculated to determine the optimal sputtering process for the a-ITO electrodes by varying the direct current power, working pressure, oxygen flow rate, and a-ITO thickness. The optimized a-ITO/COP with a high FoM value of 8.9 exhibited a low sheet resistance of 36 Ohm/square, average transmittances of 89.5 % in the visible wavelength region, and a small critical bending radius of 7 mm, which are acceptable transparent electrodes for fabrication of wearable and transparent wearable sensors. To demonstrate the feasibility of the a-ITO/COP substrate as a promising wearable sensor, we examined the performance of wearable temperature sensors, wearable heaters, and wearable glucose sensors. The successful operation of a-ITO/COP-based temperature sensors with high sensitivity, transparent heaters with a saturation temperature of 87.8 °C at 6 V, and glucose sensors with high sensitivity indicates that a-ITO/COP is a promising bio-compatible electrode for next-generation wearable bionic electronics.