Super‐Stretchable, Anti‐Freezing, Anti‐Drying Organogel Ionic Conductor for Multi‐Mode Flexible Electronics

Abstract

AbstractDue to their intrinsic flexibility, tunable conductivity, multiple stimulus‐response, and self‐healing ability, ionic conductive hydrogels have drawn significant attention in flexible/wearable electronics. However, challenges remain because traditional hydrogels inevitably faced the problems of losing flexibility and conductivity because of the inner water loss when exposed to the ambient environment. Besides, the water inside the hydrogel will freeze at the water icing temperatures, making the device hard and fragile. As a promising alternative, organogels have attracted wide attention because they can, to some extent, overcome the above drawbacks. Herein, a kind of organogel ionic conductor (MOIC) by a self‐polymerization reaction is involved, which is super stretchable, anti‐drying, and anti‐freezing. Meanwhile, it can still maintain high mechanical stability after alternately loading/unloading at the strain of 600% for 600 s (1800 cycles). Using this MOIC, high‐performance triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) is constructed (MOIC‐TENG) to harvest small mechanical energy even the MOIC electrode underwent an extremely low temperature. In addition, multifunctional flexible/wearable sensors (strain sensor, piezoresistive sensor, and tactile sensor) are realized to monitor human motions in real time, and recognize different materials by triboelectric effect. This study demonstrates a promising candidate material for flexible/wearable electronics such as electronic skin, flexible sensors, and human‐machine interfaces.