Biomimetic hair-assisted GaN optical devices for bidirectional airflow detection

Airflow sensing plays a pivotal role in numerous fields, including medicine, industry, and environmental monitoring. However, detecting bidirectional airflow using a single sensing unit poses significant challenges. In this work, a miniature airflow sensing device is introduced, utilizing a GaN optical chip integrated with a biomimetic hair structure. The sensing device comprises a monolithic GaN chip that handles both light emission and detection. The biomimetic hairs, constructed from nylon fibers and PDMS film, undergo structural bending in converting airflow signals into optical changes, modulating the light captured by the on-chip detector. The intensity of the airflow directly correlates with the bending extent of the biomimetic hair, facilitating the precise detection of airflow rates through changes in the photocurrent. The integrated device can measure a wide range of airflow rates from -23.87 ms^-1 to 21.29 ms^-1, and exhibit a rapid response time of 13 ms and a detection limit of 0.1 ms^-1. Characterized by its compact size, fast response time, and bidirectional detection ability, the developed device holds immense potential for applications in breath detection, speech recognition, encoding information, and the realization of logic operations.