A Sensible Solution for Widespread Metaverse Adoption

Virtual and augmented reality technologies have seemed to be just on the verge of going mainstream for many years now. However, present systems are still plagued with a number of limitations that continue to limit their rate of adoption. But with advances that have recently been made, new possibilities, like the metaverse, are generating a great deal of new interest in bringing these technologies to the masses. The collective virtual shared space that merges physical and digital realities offered by the metaverse could be as transformative of a technology as the world wide web was in the early 1990s.

But in order to realize this possibility, a number of advances will need to be made. One area that is presently lagging far behind what is needed is in sensing technologies. For a virtual experience to be convincing and immersive, sensors need to be able to track fine movements of the body. They must also do this in a way that is not cumbersome, so as to keep the illusion of the virtual world alive. For mass adoption, these transparent, accurate sensors would also need to be inexpensive.

Unfortunately, using conventional, rigid, silicon-based sensors, the devices tend to be bulky, inflexible, and cumbersome, which limits the amount of time that they can be used. These traditional sensors are also often expensive, which keeps them out of reach of many, and also limits the resolution of the captured data as the number of units that can be placed on the body must be minimized.

Researchers at Changchun University of Science and Technology and the City University of Hong Kong recognized that nanomaterial-based flexible sensors have the potential to transform virtual and augmented reality experiences by making the experiences comfortable and lowering the cost of entry. Sensors leveraging flexible nanomaterials can conform to the body, are very lightweight, and typically exhibit high levels of sensitivity. To shine a light on these emerging technologies and give fellow researchers the information they need to incorporate them into their own designs, the team wrote a review detailing the present state of the art in flexible nanomaterial-based sensors and the applications that they can be used for.

The many potential fabrication methods for producing sensors from nanomaterials are discussed, such as ink coating, spray coating, drop casting, laser direct writing, printing, and electrophoretic deposition. If fine control of material size and structure are needed, printing, for example, might be a good option, whereas larger and more organized structures can more easily be produced via ink or spray coating.

The nanoscale structures of the materials can also be of tremendous importance to the function of the resulting device. Structures such as nanoparticles, nanowires, and nanofilms are evaluated, and their unique properties that add to flexibility, reduced power consumption or weight, or enhance biocompatibility or sensitivity are discussed in detail. These structural features can also be pivotal in the creation of durable and comfortable flexible sensing devices.

After a lengthy review of different types of materials and the use cases they are best suited for, the team turned their focus to the various methods by which these sensors can be triggered. Depending on one’s needs, nanomaterial-based sensors can be triggered in numerous ways, including the physical movements of the body, changes in temperature, interactions with magnetism, integration with the nervous system, and much more.

Finally, the researchers note that interpretation of data collected from nanomaterial-based sensors is not always straightforward. They outline a number of machine learning-based approaches that simplify these interpretations.

As was demonstrated in this review, alternative sensing technologies offer many advantages over traditional methods. They may prove to be a key factor in finally bringing virtual and augmented reality technologies, and the metaverse, to a wider audience.