Recent advances in soft materials, robotics, and manufacturing technologies have inspired many innovations in biomedical engineering like wearable electronics, implantable sensors, and new intervention methods. Soft intelligent materials can generate mechanical deformation when subjected to external stimuli like optics, acoustics, mechanics, electric field, magnetic field, etc., resulting in new properties or functions. To address the grand challenges in understanding the interfaces between human beings and medical devices, we will show our recent progress in the development of the medical devices using soft intelligent materials. This talk will present: i) how to address the current limitations for the existing cochlea implant, which can only restore functional hearing for patients with severe hearing loss. We proposed a bioinspired soft elastic metamaterial that reproduces the shape and key functions of the human cochlea, blazing a promising trail for reconstruction of natural hearing for patients. ii) how to address the comprehensive challenges posed by wireless implantable sensors. We designed an implantable, bioresorbable, and wireless sensor for monitoring multimodal and decoupled physiological signals of human bodies. iii) how to address the current challenges in the treatment of cerebral aneurysms and brain tumors by the conventional embolization method. We proposed magnetic soft microfiberbots with high steerability, reliable maneuverability, and multi-modal shape reconfigurability to perform robotic embolization in submillimeter regions via a remote, untethered, and magnetically controllable manner. In conclusion, a perspective will be given on designing new medical devices based on the emerging soft materials technologies.
Dr. Jianfeng Zang is Professor of School of Integrated Circuits, Wuhan National Laboratory for Optoelectronics, and The State Key Laboratory of Intelligent Manufacturing Equipment and Technology, Huazhong University of Science and Technology (HUST). He studied materials science and engineering and Condensed-Matter physics for his B.E. and M.S. degrees at Jilin University. He studied microelectronics and biomedical engineering for PhD in Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. After worked as postdoctoral fellow in University of South Carolina and Duke University, he joined HUST. His research focuses on interdisciplinary area on soft intelligent materials for medical devices. He published more than 80 papers in prestigious journals including Nature Materials, Science Robotics, Nature Communications, and Science Advances. He served in Youth Editorial Board for Engineering, and as organizer for several international conferences on Flexible Electronics and Soft Robotics. He received several awards including National Youth Talent Program, IAAM 2023 Scientist Medal, and Hubei Province Natural Science Award.
Electronic skins can convert stimuli from the environment to electrical signals, and are a promising technology for robot haptics and wearable healthcare. A key challenge for electronic skins is that many sensing parameters, including sensitivity, sensing range, linearity, and sensing stability, can often not be optimized simultaneously. Such issues mostly stem from the specific properties of soft materials and the interfacial behaviors of the devices. Here, we focus on the material-structure-interface-property correlation, and show that some of the key parameters, can be synergized in a single device, by using new materials, microstructures, or interfaces. I will show that an electronic skin can be made to have high sensitivity, high stability, rapid response speed, and little signal drift. Such devices may be used for applications in haptics of humanoid robots and physiological signal collection of humans.
Dr. Chuan-Fei Guo is a Professor of Materials Science and Engineering at the Southern University of Science and Technology (SUSTech). He received his bachelor’s degree on Material Science and Engineering in the Huazhong University of Science and Technology (HUST), 2006. In 2011, he earned a PhD degree on Condensed Matter Physics from the Chinese Academy of Sciences. From 2011 to 2016, Dr. Guo worked as a postdoctoral fellow (research associate) at Boston College and the University of Houston. He joined SUSTech since 2016. His research focuses on flexible electronics and bioelectronics. Dr. Guo has published over 150 journal articles in journals of Nature Materials, Nature Communications, PNAS, Science Advances etc., and his papers are cited over 10k times. He has applied 48 patents and hold 27 granted inventions. He is now an editor of Materials Today Physics.