Biointerfaces

This study demonstrates that a dynamic hydrogel composite can release cellular-size granules in the physiological environments for regenerative medicine and bioelectronics, which has been long sought in the development of hydrogel-based artificial cells21. A monolithic-to-focal evolving process allows the composite to harness the properties and functions of both monolithic and focal biointerfaces. The hydrogel composites use gelatin and chitosan as the hydrogel matrix to respond to biological environments while also facilitating macroscopic material shaping and manipulation.

We designed a soil-inspired chemical system that consists of nanostructured minerals, starch granules and liquid metals. The soil-inspired material possesses chemical, optical and mechanical responsiveness to yield write–erase functions in electrical performance. The composite can also modulate bacterial growth both in vitro and in vivo, such as enriches gut bacteria diversity, rectifies tetracycline-induced gut microbiome dysbiosis and ameliorates dextran sulfate sodium-induced rodent colitis symptoms within rodent models.

In this work, we show that the periplasm, an underappreciated subcellular region in materials research, can offer a nongenetic pathway for biomineralization of metastable semiconductor nanoclusters. Under light stimulation, the metastable semiconductor nanoclusters could couple with the electron transport chain to increase ATP levels and enhance malate production in the living hybrids. Using the E. coli strain as a model, the current system to develop periplasmic biointerface for enhanced solar-to-chemical production might be extended to other bacterial cells to potentially endow additional sustainability level to the bioremediation applications

We developed a cost-competitive and environmentally friendly approach that is promising for sustainable and scalable production of semiconductor biohybrids towards solar-driven chemical production utilizing multiple pollutants in wastewater. Compared with fossil-fuels refining and sugar-based bacterial fermentation, the wastewater-derived biohybrid system shows lower carbon emission and production cost. We believe wastewater-based hybrid fermentation will provide an alternative for both sustainable biomanufacturing and environmental remediation.

Nanowired human cardiac organoids significantly augment the therapeutic potential of hPSC-CMs for heart repair. While cardiac organoids have been used for cardiac tissue engineering applications, this study reveals e-SiNWs as a class of biocompatible, conductive nanomaterials that facilitate contractile and noncontractile benefits in hPSC-CM transplantation. Given the emerging clinical applications of hPSC-CMs to treat infarcted hearts, these results have direct translational impacts for conductive nanomaterials in cardiac cell therapy and implications in other conductive tissues (e.g., skeletal muscle and neuronal tissues).

In this work, we showed that a porosity-based heterojunction, a largely overlooked system in materials science, can yield an efficient photoelectrochemical response from the semiconductor surface.

In this review, we explored the fundamental chemical roles and principles involved in designing these interfaces, such as the (bio)chemical evolution of adaptive or buffer zones. We proposed a soft–hard interaction framework and use it to discuss soft–hard interfacial processes in multiple systems and across several spatiotemporal scales, focusing on tissue-like materials and devices.

In this work, we identified several soft- hard composite designs in naturally occurring systems, and we use these designs to categorize the existing bioelectric interfaces and to suggest future opportunities in bioelectric studies.

In this work, we demonstrated that cellular-scale hydrated starch granules, an underexplored component in materials science, could turn conventional hydrogels into tissue-like materials when composites were formed.

We designed a liquid metal based composite that can change from non-conductive states to fully conductive states with mechanical pressure. Therefore, we can simply use a pen to create arbitrary conductive circuits on a soft substrate.