Flexible 3D-Printed EEG Electrodes

• Published in: Sensors (Basel, Switzerland) Vol. 19; no. 7; p. 1650
• Main Authors: Velcescu, Andrei, Lindley, Alexander, Cursio, Ciro, Krachunov, Sammy, Beach, Christopher, Brown, Christopher A, Jones, Anthony K P, Casson, Alexander J
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Switzerland MDPI 06.04.2019; MDPI AG
• Subjects: 3D printing; EEG; electrode; electrode; EEG; 3D printing
• ISSN: 1424-8220; 1424-8220
• DOI: 10.3390/s19071650

For electroencephalography (EEG) in haired regions of the head, finger-based electrodes have been proposed in order to part the hair and make a direct contact with the scalp. Previous work has demonstrated 3D-printed fingered electrodes to allow personalisation and different configurations of electrodes to be used for different people or for different parts of the head. This paper presents flexible 3D-printed EEG electrodes for the first time. A flexible 3D printing element is now used, with three different base mechanical structures giving differently-shaped electrodes. To obtain improved sensing performance, the silver coatings used previously have been replaced with a silver/silver-chloride coating. This results in reduced electrode contact impedance and reduced contact noise. Detailed electro-mechanical testing is presented to demonstrate the performance of the operation of the new electrodes, particularly with regards to changes in conductivity under compression, together with on-person tests to demonstrate the recording of EEG signals.