MIT, Microsoft invent smart temporary tattoos

It seems the most useful thing wearables have been able to do for users recently is activity tracking, which has become fairly popular and helped boost the sale of smart wristbands and watches. Wearables, however, have hardly taken off the way smartphones did. Maybe consumers are just waiting to be able to control their electronic devices straight from their arms. MIT Media Lab and Microsoft Research teamed up to create a temporary tattoo that can do just that. DuoSkin is a metallic temporary tattoo made from gold leaf that creates interfaces on people's skin, allowing them to interact with other devices.

Currently, DuoSkin has three different kinds of interface. The first turns it into an input device that effectively converts a user's skin into a trackpad. This allows people to move a mouse cursor on a computer screen from their skin or control media playback. The second type is called "output display," which allows a tattoo of a given shape to change color or light up based on body temperature. The last type is a communication device similar to an NFC tag. This is something that has already been shown to be useful in smart watches. People are able to pay for things via Apple Pay on the Apple Watch, for example. It is easy to see how a temporary tattoo could be useful in this context.

Since gold leaf is very thin and malleable, anyone can make their own circuit designs on a computer and print it out on a tattoo paper. Gold leaf can be layered on after and then removed. This is a new level of customizability not seen in wearables before. In fact, it is not something that is present in personal electronics in general.

The main key to seeing this kind of technology take off is how important people find it. One of the impediments to wearables growth has been how useful the products are relative to cost. There is certainly a large market in some places for inexpensive activity trackers such as the Mi Band, but the most popular smart watch, the Apple Watch, has a considerably higher price. Temporary tattoos might offer a good combination of functionality and low price with the addition of being highly customizable. However, it may take some time for the technology to go to market.