Wide temperature range, ultra-extensible piezoelectric sensor for aircraft surface impact monitoring

Flexible sensors that can be laminated on curved surfaces are a desired form for aircraft surface impact monitoring. Sensors for such applications must withstand the wide range of temperature fluctuations on aircraft surfaces during flight and exhibit excellent extensibility to attach to and monitor large-scale curved surfaces, whereas existing flexible sensors fail to meet these demands. Here, we report a wide temperature range, ultra-extensible piezoelectric sensor. The sensor employs a flexible piezoelectric film based on polydopamine@barium titanate/cellulose as the sensing layer, enabling excellent temperature stability across a wide range from −50 to 80 °C. The tensile axial interconnects and horizontal connections linking external contact to sensor units, together with a sequential stacking process for the row arrays, enable the overall dual-axis extension of the sensor array with a strain ratio of up to 2500%. The ultra-extensible sensor array is attached to the aircraft surface to monitor impact signals continuously. Via an embedded impact localization algorithm, the response times of 25-channel impact signal data were analyzed to achieve localization of the impact. The ultra-extensible piezoelectric sensor with a wide temperature range holds significant practical value for monitoring unexpected impacts on aircraft surfaces, and will greatly advance the development of structural health monitoring technology for aviation equipment.