[Research] Prof. Sang-woo Kim’s research team develops world’s first ultrasound-mediated Fully Biodegradable and Implantable Triboe
- 신소재공학부
- Hit1854
- 2022-02-03
Prof. Sang-Woo Kim’s research team develops
world’s first ultrasound-mediated Fully Biodegradable and Implantable Triboelectric Nanogenerator
- Promising solution for eliminating the need for secondary surgery to remove the implantable medical devices (IMD) after the clinical timelines
[Image] Prof. Sang-Woo Kim, Ph.D. Candidate Dong-Min Lee, and Najaf Rubab (from the left)
The research team led by Prof. Sang-Woo Kim developed the world’s first ultrasound-mediated Fully Biodegradable and Implantable Triboelectric Nanogenerator (FBI-TENG). By mediating the ultrasound intensity, the FBI-TENG can be fully dissolved in the body in a short period of time at any specific moment with eliminating the need for secondary surgery to remove IMDs.
Implantable electroceuticals, a class of technology that cures diseases (e.g., pain, and depression) in a short time (generally within 6 months), are of great interest in areas throughout medicine, and biomedical implants. However, they require the secondary surgery to remove the implants, which causes physical and psychological burden to patients. Many researches have been reported to develop implantable electroceuticals that equip biodegradable functions, but they encountered critical challenge, full biodegradation in a controlled manner within several minutes.
Conventional transient materials were limited to exploit passive degradation, relying on their own thickness and material properties. In addition, they require at least several weeks to months for themselves to be fully degraded inside the body, which their residues can induce severe toxicity or negative health conditions.
[Figure 1] Schematic of an Ultrasound-mediated in vivo biodegradable triboelectric nanogenerator
Herein, the research team suggested a promising solution for minimizing the potential negative factors to health conditions, by developing the technology that dissolve the device within 30 minutes in a controlled manner using medically available ultrasound.
[Figure 2] Theoretical and experimental studies of transient performances for FBI-TENG under ultrasound stimulation.
The research team demonstrated that the FBI-TENG generates electricity without power degradation under the low-intensity ultrasound (1.0 W cm-2) and performs transient processes at the programmed time under high-intensity ultrasound (3.0 W cm-2).
[Figure 3] Ex vivo demonstration of ultrasound triggered biodegradation FBI-TENG.
The research team inserted the FBI-TENG into porcine tissue, a comparable anatomical structure to human, to conduct ex-vivo experiments. They found that the high-intensity ultrasound (3.0 W cm-2) can dissolve the device within few minutes inside the tissue.
[Figure 4] Evaluation of Energy Generation of FBI-TENG
The research team confirmed stable power generation (0.34 V and 3.20 μA) and complete biodegradation of the FBI-TENG, inserted at the 0.5 cm depth from the porcine epidermis, in 40 minutes by mediating ultrasound intensity.
Prof. Sang-Woo Kim said, “it is an outstanding development that the FBI-TENG is the world’s first biodegradable and implantable TENG that can be fully biodegraded in a short time just by mediating the ultrasound intensity”. He added, “we expect the findings can be a promising approach for the next-generation medical device industries.”
This work was financially supported by Nano Material Technology Development Program (2020M3H4A1A03084600) and Basic Science Research Program (2021R1A2C2010990) through the National Research Foundation (NRF) of Korea grant.
This research was published in Science Advances on January 7, an international academic journal published by the American Association for Advancement of Science (AAAS)
Paper: Ultrasound-mediated triboelectric nanogenerator for powering on-demand transient electronics