{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,8,21]],"date-time":"2026-08-21T11:51:49Z","timestamp":1787313109737,"version":"build-2736575974"},"reference-count":39,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"7","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2026,6,28]],"date-time":"2026-06-28T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1782604800000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"name":"Youth Project of National Natural Science Foundation of China","award":["62403440"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["62403440"]}]},{"award":["62403440"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["62403440"]}],"id":[{"id":"https:\/\/ror.org\/01h0zpd94","id-type":"ROR","asserted-by":"publisher"}]},{"name":"Shanxi Key Laboratory of Advanced Semiconductor Optoelectronic Devices and System Integration","award":["2024SZKF10"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["2024SZKF10"]}]},{"name":"Scientific Research Start-up Project for Recruited Talents of Taiyuan University","award":["25TYKY115"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["25TYKY115"]}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Micromachines"],"abstract":"<jats:p>To address prevalent industrial challenges, including the high cost of fabricating microstructures via photolithography and 3D printing, impurity residues easily generated by conventional physical\/chemical pore-forming techniques, and the limited sensitivity of regular capacitive sensors, this paper innovatively proposes an integrated low-temperature in situ gas foaming strategy using ammonium bicarbonate for the fabrication of porous TPU-based ionic gels. Relying on the complete gaseous decomposition property of ammonium bicarbonate upon heating, a three-dimensionally interconnected continuous porous network is spontaneously constructed inside the polymer matrix. Thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU) is selected as the continuous polymer phase, and [EMIM][TFSI] imidazolium ionic liquid is blended as the ion source to synthesize composite ionic gel substrates. A PDMS composite slurry filled with graphene is employed to prepare flexible substrates, followed by low-temperature oxygen plasma surface modification to introduce polar functional groups such as hydroxyl and carboxyl onto electrode surfaces. A standard sandwich-structured ionic pressure sensor with the configuration of \u201ctop modified electrode\u2014porous ionic gel dielectric layer\u2014bottom modified electrode\u201d is finally assembled. The porous framework and modified electrodes constitute a dual synergistic enhancement system: the porous structure markedly reduces the equivalent elastic modulus of the gel and improves its compressive deformation capacity; polar-modified electrodes optimize the interfacial compatibility between electrodes and gels, shorten ion migration paths and lower interfacial contact resistance. Systematic calibration of multiple batches of parallel samples reveals that the as-fabricated sensor achieves a high sensitivity of 25.3 kPa\u22121 across the full measuring range from 0 to 1000 kPa with a linear fitting coefficient R2 = 0.992. The loading response time and unloading recovery time of the device are 60 ms and 80 ms respectively, with a performance degradation of less than 3% after 1000 consecutive loading\u2013unloading cycles, featuring low hysteresis error and excellent signal repeatability. Multi-scenario in vivo wearable tests on human subjects verify that the device can precisely capture subtle fluctuations of radial artery pulse and periodic laryngeal deformation during swallowing, distinguish characteristic waveform patterns of various English words according to differences in vocal cord vibration, and accurately detect bending motions when attached to finger joints. The entire fabrication process adopts common chemical raw materials and standard laboratory equipment without expensive micro-nano processing facilities, featuring convenient raw material procurement and high process fault tolerance, which enables large-area coating-based mass production. This work delivers a novel technical route for the low-cost large-scale production of high-performance ionic flexible sensors and bears significant industrialization reference value for applications in wearable medical monitoring, bionic robotic electronic skin, flexible human\u2013machine interactive touch panels and other related fields.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/mi17070787","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2026,6,30]],"date-time":"2026-06-30T08:26:15Z","timestamp":1782807975000},"page":"787","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":1,"title":["Flexible Iontronic Pressure Sensor Based on Ammonium Bicarbonate In-Situ Pore-Forming Porous Ionic Gel"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"17","author":[{"given":"Zhiling","family":"Li","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Intelligent and Information Engineering, Taiyuan University, Taiyuan 030032, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Zhixian","family":"Li","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"State Grid Xiangyuan County Electric Power Supply Company, Changzhi 046200, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Liming","family":"Qin","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Jinxi Industries Group Co., Ltd., Taiyuan 030027, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-2018-8664","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Xiaodong","family":"Huang","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Intelligent and Information Engineering, Taiyuan University, Taiyuan 030032, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Pan","family":"Pei","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Key Laboratory of Instrumentation Science and Dynamic Measurement, North University of China, Taiyuan 030051, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2026,6,28]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Jafarizadeh, B., Chowdhury, A.H., Khakpour, I., Pala, N., and Wang, C. 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