I don’t know if you already knew that rubber materials cannot conduct electricity well and that metals do not stretch. However, a team of Japanese scientists from the University of Tokyo found a way to combine them and they developed a rubber material that conducts electricity.

They called it “e-skin” and they will apply it on robots which will be able to feel the and pressure just like humans. This material has integrated carbon nanotubes and after that an ionic liquid is added therefore the e-skin will be just as flexible as regular rubber, but will conduct electricity 570 times better.

“As robots enter our everyday life, they need to have sensors everywhere on their bodies like humans. Imagine they bump into babies. Robots need to feel temperatures, heat and pressure like we do to co-exist. Otherwise it would be dangerous,” said Tsuyoshi Sekitani, research associate.

According to its developers, the e-skin can be stretched by 2.3 times its size, but its conductivity will drop with 50 percent. It seems like the rubber can be stretched by 38 percent and its conductivity will not decrease therefore it could help at creating integrated circuits in order to mount them on curved surfaces.

The research team was led by Takao Someya from School of Engineering at the University of Tokyo and even if he is aware that a lot of work needs to be done, he is very confident that the e-skin will improve the interactions between humans and robots.