In-vivo blood pressure sensing with bi-filler nanocomposite

Abstract: Conductive elastomers present desirable qualities for sensing pressure in-vivo, such as high piezoresistance in tiny volumes, conformability and, biocompatibility. Many PDMS-based electrically conductive nanocomposites however, are susceptible to electrical drift following repeated stress cycles and chemical aging. Innovative approaches are needed to stabilize their percolation network against deformation to improve reproducibility and facilitate sensor calibration. One approach we propose here is to decouple the tunnelling-percolation network of HOPG nanoparticles from the incomplete viscoelastic recovery of the PDMS matrix by inserting minute amounts of insulating SiO$_2$ nanospheres. SiO$_2$ nanospheres effectively reduce the number of nearest neighbours at each percolation node switching off the parallel electrical pathways that might become activated by incomplete viscoelastic relaxation. We varied the size of SiO$_2$ nanospheres and their filling fraction to demonstrate nearly complete piezoresistance recovery when SiO$_2$ and HOPG nanoparticles have equal diameters ($\approx$400nm) and SiO$_2$ and HOPG volume fractions are 1% and 29.5% respectively. We demonstrate an in-vivo blood pressure sensor based on this bi-filler composite.