Soft Mixed Conductors Towards Bioelectronics with Unconventional Form Factors

Direct measurement and stimulation of ionic, biomolecular, cellular, and tissue-scale activity is a staple of bioelectronic diagnosis and/or therapy. Such bi-directional interfacing can be enhanced by a unique set of properties imparted by organic electronic materials. These materials, based on conjugated polymers, can be adapted for use in biological settings and show significant molecular-level interaction with their local environment, readily swell, and provide soft, seamless mechanical matching with tissue. At the same time, their swelling and mixed conduction allows for enhanced ionic-electronic coupling for transduction of biosignals. Such properties stress the importance of bulk transport processes, and serve to enable new capabilities, device concepts, and form factors relevant for, for example, electroactive scaffolds and bioactive constructs to modulate tissue state and/or cell fate. In this talk, I will demonstrate how molecular design and processing can be leveraged to achieve soft, conductive composites that are amenable to 3D printing, for example by micro-scale continuous liquid interface processes. Particle-based active materials can be readily tuned, integrated into process flows, and post-processed to achieve scalable soft, flexible, and stretchable electronics. New materials design will continue to fill critical need gaps for challenging problems in bio-electronic interfacing, regenerative engineering, and soft robotics.