Fatigue-free Artificial Ionic Skin Toughened by Self-healable Elastic Nanomesh

Overview

Journal Nat Commun

Specialty Biology

Date 2022 Jul 29

PMID 35906238

Authors

Jiqiang Wang

Baohu Wu

Peng Wei

Shengtong Sun

Peiyi Wu

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Robust ionic sensing materials that are both fatigue-resistant and self-healable like human skin are essential for soft electronics and robotics with extended service life. However, most existing self-healable artificial ionic skins produced on the basis of network reconfiguration suffer from a low fatigue threshold due to the easy fracture of low-energy amorphous polymer chains with susceptible crack propagation. Here we engineer a fatigue-free yet fully healable hybrid ionic skin toughened by a high-energy, self-healable elastic nanomesh, resembling the repairable nanofibrous interwoven structure of human skin. Such a design affords a superhigh fatigue threshold of 2950 J m while maintaining skin-like compliance, stretchability, and strain-adaptive stiffening response. Moreover, nanofiber tension-induced moisture breathing of ionic matrix leads to a record-high strain-sensing gauge factor of 66.8, far exceeding previous intrinsically stretchable ionic conductors. This concept creates opportunities for designing durable ion-conducting materials that replicate the unparalleled combinatory properties of natural skins more precisely.

Citing Articles

Bio-Inspired Ionic Sensors: Transforming Natural Mechanisms into Sensory Technologies.

Choi K, Lee G, Lee M, Hwang H, Lee K, Lee Y Nanomicro Lett. 2025; 17(1):180.

PMID: 40072809 PMC: 11904071. DOI: 10.1007/s40820-025-01692-6.

A Universal Strategy to Mitigate Microphase Separation via Cellulose Nanocrystal Hydration in Fabricating Strong, Tough, and Fatigue-Resistant Hydrogels.

Wang S, Yu Z, Sun X, Panahi-Sarmad M, Yang P, Zhu P Adv Mater. 2025; 37(7):e2416916.

PMID: 39969391 PMC: 11837898. DOI: 10.1002/adma.202416916.

A Cellulose Ionogel with Rubber-Like Stretchability for Low-Grade Heat Harvesting.

Long Q, Jiang G, Zhou J, Zhao D, Yu H Research (Wash D C). 2024; 7:0533.

PMID: 39559347 PMC: 11570788. DOI: 10.34133/research.0533.

Fabric-based lamina emergent MXene-based electrode for electrophysiological monitoring.

Lee S, Ho D, Jekal J, Cho S, Choi Y, Oh S Nat Commun. 2024; 15(1):5974.

PMID: 39358330 PMC: 11446925. DOI: 10.1038/s41467-024-49939-x.

A reconfigurable and conformal liquid sensor for ambulatory cardiac monitoring.

Zhao X, Zhou Y, Kwak W, Li A, Wang S, Dallenger M Nat Commun. 2024; 15(1):8492.

PMID: 39353899 PMC: 11445489. DOI: 10.1038/s41467-024-52462-8.

References

Morelle X, Illeperuma W, Tian K, Bai R, Suo Z, Vlassak J . Highly Stretchable and Tough Hydrogels below Water Freezing Temperature. Adv Mater. 2018; 30(35):e1801541. DOI: 10.1002/adma.201801541. View

Li Z, Zhu Y, Niu W, Yang X, Jiang Z, Lu Z . Healable and Recyclable Elastomers with Record-High Mechanical Robustness, Unprecedented Crack Tolerance, and Superhigh Elastic Restorability. Adv Mater. 2021; 33(27):e2101498. DOI: 10.1002/adma.202101498. View

Wang X, Zhan S, Lu Z, Li J, Yang X, Qiao Y . Healable, Recyclable, and Mechanically Tough Polyurethane Elastomers with Exceptional Damage Tolerance. Adv Mater. 2020; 32(50):e2005759. DOI: 10.1002/adma.202005759. View

Brown A, Litvinov R, Discher D, Purohit P, Weisel J . Multiscale mechanics of fibrin polymer: gel stretching with protein unfolding and loss of water. Science. 2009; 325(5941):741-4. PMC: 2846107. DOI: 10.1126/science.1172484. View

Zhang W, Wu B, Sun S, Wu P . Skin-like mechanoresponsive self-healing ionic elastomer from supramolecular zwitterionic network. Nat Commun. 2021; 12(1):4082. PMC: 8253733. DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-24382-4. View

Choi S, Eom Y, Kim S, Jeong D, Han J, Koo J . A Self-Healing Nanofiber-Based Self-Responsive Time-Temperature Indicator for Securing a Cold-Supply Chain. Adv Mater. 2020; 32(11):e1907064. DOI: 10.1002/adma.201907064. View

Hua M, Wu S, Ma Y, Zhao Y, Chen Z, Frenkel I . Strong tough hydrogels via the synergy of freeze-casting and salting out. Nature. 2021; 590(7847):594-599. DOI: 10.1038/s41586-021-03212-z. View

Vatankhah-Varnosfaderani M, Keith A, Cong Y, Liang H, Rosenthal M, Sztucki M . Chameleon-like elastomers with molecularly encoded strain-adaptive stiffening and coloration. Science. 2018; 359(6383):1509-1513. DOI: 10.1126/science.aar5308. View

Heng W, Solomon S, Gao W . Flexible Electronics and Devices as Human-Machine Interfaces for Medical Robotics. Adv Mater. 2021; 34(16):e2107902. PMC: 9035141. DOI: 10.1002/adma.202107902. View

10.

He C, Sun S, Wu P . Intrinsically stretchable sheath-core ionic sensory fibers with well-regulated conformal and reprogrammable buckling. Mater Horiz. 2021; 8(7):2088-2096. DOI: 10.1039/d1mh00736j. View

11.

Pan L, Cai P, Mei L, Cheng Y, Zeng Y, Wang M . A Compliant Ionic Adhesive Electrode with Ultralow Bioelectronic Impedance. Adv Mater. 2020; 32(38):e2003723. DOI: 10.1002/adma.202003723. View

12.

Lin S, Liu X, Liu J, Yuk H, Loh H, Parada G . Anti-fatigue-fracture hydrogels. Sci Adv. 2019; 5(1):eaau8528. PMC: 6357728. DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.aau8528. View

13.

Lanir Y, Fung Y . Two-dimensional mechanical properties of rabbit skin. I. Experimental system. J Biomech. 1974; 7(1):29-34. DOI: 10.1016/0021-9290(74)90067-0. View

14.

Yang W, Sherman V, Gludovatz B, Schaible E, Stewart P, Ritchie R . On the tear resistance of skin. Nat Commun. 2015; 6:6649. PMC: 4389263. DOI: 10.1038/ncomms7649. View

15.

Kim S, Jeon H, Shin S, Park S, Jegal J, Hwang S . Superior Toughness and Fast Self-Healing at Room Temperature Engineered by Transparent Elastomers. Adv Mater. 2017; 30(1). DOI: 10.1002/adma.201705145. View

16.

Khatib M, Zohar O, Haick H . Self-Healing Soft Sensors: From Material Design to Implementation. Adv Mater. 2021; 33(11):e2004190. DOI: 10.1002/adma.202004190. View

17.

Li X, Cui K, Kurokawa T, Ye Y, Sun T, Yu C . Effect of mesoscale phase contrast on fatigue-delaying behavior of self-healing hydrogels. Sci Adv. 2021; 7(16). PMC: 8046377. DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.abe8210. View

18.

Yao M, Wu B, Feng X, Sun S, Wu P . A Highly Robust Ionotronic Fiber with Unprecedented Mechanomodulation of Ionic Conduction. Adv Mater. 2021; 33(42):e2103755. DOI: 10.1002/adma.202103755. View

19.

Diaz-Marin C, Zhang L, Lu Z, Alshrah M, Grossman J, Wang E . Kinetics of Sorption in Hygroscopic Hydrogels. Nano Lett. 2022; 22(3):1100-1107. DOI: 10.1021/acs.nanolett.1c04216. View

20.

Liang X, Chen G, Lin S, Zhang J, Wang L, Zhang P . Anisotropically Fatigue-Resistant Hydrogels. Adv Mater. 2021; 33(30):e2102011. DOI: 10.1002/adma.202102011. View