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Bioelectronics

Injectable liquid bioelectronics

Nature Reviews Bioengineering volume 2, page 452 (2024)Cite this article

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Colloidal suspensions enable the design of injectable bioelectronics, for example, to measure internal physiological signals. The stability of colloidal suspensions is fundamentally influenced by the interplay between particle gravity and Brownian motion (that is, thermal fluctuations of nanoparticles in a fluid), which is crucial for applications ranging from actuation to sensing. A persistent challenge has been achieving permanent magnetism in colloidal suspensions without compromising their stability. Now, writing in Nature Materials, Jun Chen and colleagues overcome this challenge by developing a new material, permanent fluidic magnet (PFM), to be used as an ultrasoft and conformal liquid bioelectronic system for injectable and retrievable biosensing.

When injected onto the heart of rats, the PFM was able to wirelessly detect internal physiological signals, showing stable and conformal adherence to the organ. “This is important, as current solid-state bioelectronics poorly interface with biological tissues, and their implantation often requires invasive surgery,” explains Chen. A coil was then attached to the rat’s skin to generate current and acquire electrical cardiac signals, with the PFM revealing a stronger signal-to-noise ratio in capturing biomechanical movements, as well as different cardiac arrhythmias, than on-skin devices. “The PFM-based liquid bioelectronics generated more reliable electrical signals than electrocardiogram (ECG) against mechanical disturbance, and are thus more stable against motion artifacts,” adds Chen. Similar results were achieved for the lungs and liver.

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References

Original article

  • Zhao, X. et al. Permanent fluidic magnets for liquid bioelectronics. Nat. Mater. 23, 703–710 (2024)

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  1. Nature Reviews Bioengineering https://www.nature.com/natrevbioeng/

    Sadra Bakhshandeh

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  1. Sadra Bakhshandeh
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Correspondence to Sadra Bakhshandeh.

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This text on an editorially selected paper was initially drafted using artificial intelligence, then revised and fact-checked by an editor to meet Nature Portfolio publication standards.

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Bakhshandeh, S. Injectable liquid bioelectronics. Nat Rev Bioeng 2, 452 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s44222-024-00201-5

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