Permeable graphited hemp fabrics-based, wearing-comfortable pressure sensors for monitoring human activities

•This work addresses the critical dilemma between device performance and breathability.•The sensor shows an outstanding working range and detection limit.•The sensors were fabricated via a knitting process and a simple heat approach.•It provides a new route for achieving breathable and high-performance pressure sensors. Pressure sensors are vital components of wearable electronics for human-machine interaction, health monitoring, disease prevention and so on. State-of-the-art pressure sensors often require the use of encapsulating materials such as polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) to provide the mechanical durability, which significantly deteriorates the detection limit, permeability and wearing comfort of the pressure sensors. This paper reports a new type of encapsulation-free, low-detection-limit, and highly permeable pressure sensors, which are made with resilient graphited knitting hemp fabrics. The hemp sensors possess appealing properties including excellent permeability to air, water vapor, and moisture, low detection limit (0.3 Pa), wide working range (up to 500 kPa) outstanding cycling stability and durability. It provides a new route for achieving wearing comfortable and high-performance pressure sensors.