Alireza Akbarinejad

Recent advances in electro‐responsive wound dressings have enabled on‐demand drug delivery or electrical stimulation (ES) to accelerate healing; however, integrating both functions within a single platform remains challenging. Here, we report a multifunctional dressing based on a conductive, porous substrate comprising a thiolated hyaluronic acid (THA)‐grafted PEDOT copolymer, P(EDOT‐ co ‐EDOT‐ g ‐THA). The material is fabricated by copolymerizing 3,4‐ethylenedioxythiophene (EDOT) and S ‐((2,3‐dihydrothieno[3,4‐ b ][1,4]dioxin‐2‐yl)methyl)ethanethioate (EDOT‐SAc) on flexible Au‐coated electrospun PCL fiber mats, followed by electrochemical activation to generate thiols for THA conjugation. The conjugated THA can be released in a controlled manner via reductive cleavage of disulfide bonds (−0.8 V vs. Ag/AgCl). THA incorporation enhances hydrophilicity and conductivity, while forming a hydrated antifouling interface that resists protein adsorption and cell adhesion. In vitro studies using NIH 3T3 fibroblasts show that electrochemically released THA retains bioactivity, promoting cell proliferation, migration, and wound closure comparable to free THA. Furthermore, sequential THA release and ES induce reversible cell detachment without cytotoxicity and enhance intercellular F‐actin polymerization. Collectively, this platform functions as a dynamic biointerface integrating antifouling capability, controlled biomolecule delivery, and electrical stimulation, highlighting its potential as a multifunctional wound dressing for advanced therapeutic applications.

We systematically reveal for the first time how processing, specifically hydration, governs piezoelectric-like responses in chitosan, achieving d ₃₃ values of 11.3 pC N ⁻¹ .

Piezoelectric energy generation is relevant for developing advanced electronics. However, the poor understanding of the influence of triboelectricity as an alternate charge generation mechanism has, in many cases, resulted in the reporting of exaggerated piezoelectric outputs. Herein, the signal output is systematically investigated from a range of organic piezoelectric materials (poled polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF)), moderately piezoelectric (heat‐treated PVDF), and non‐piezoelectric (non‐poled PVDF), polytetrafluoroelthylene (Teflon) and nylon) under tapping and compression (33 direction) and stretching (31 direction) in both encapsulated and non‐encapsulated forms. This findings reveal that regardless of their piezoelectric properties, all tested materials exhibit substantial voltage outputs (4.2–4.6 V) during tapping, primarily attributed to the triboelectric effect at the contact interface. The triboelectric contribution to the signal is reduced by 99% in compression mode for non‐piezoelectric materials and the piezoelectric signal is the primary contributor in the stretching mode with a high signal output of 7.71 V N⁻¹ for poled PVDF and a negligible signal (0.01–0.12 V N⁻¹) for non‐piezoelectric materials. Moreover, elastomeric encapsulation is demonstrated to markedly increase triboelectric signals in tapping mode. These results have important implications for the future design of piezoelectric‐triboelectric devices and the accurate interpretation of the data obtained from such devices.

Electrochemically-driven terpolymer, P(EDOT- co -EDOTSAc- co -EDOTEG), offers rapid and controllable connexin43 antisense conjugation and release.

With the emergence of deadly viral and bacterial infections, preventing the spread of microorganisms on surfaces has gained ever-increasing importance. This study investigates the potential of solid-state supercapacitors as antibacterial and antiviral devices. We developed a low-cost and flexible carbon cloth supercapacitor (CCSC) with highly efficient antibacterial and antiviral surface properties. The CCSC comprised two parallel layers of carbon cloth (CC) electrodes assembled in a symmetric, electrical double-layer supercapacitor structure that can be charged at low potentials between 1 to 2 V. The optimized CCSC exhibited a capacitance of 4.15 ± 0.3 mF cm⁻² at a scan rate of 100 mV s⁻¹, high-rate capability (83% retention of capacitance at 100 mV s⁻¹ compared to its value at 5 mV s⁻¹), and excellent electrochemical stability (97% retention of the initial capacitance after 1000 cycles). Moreover, the CCSC demonstrated outstanding flexibility and retained its full capacitance even when bent at high angles, making it suitable for wearable or flexible devices. Using its stored electrical charge, the charged CCSC disinfects bacteria effectively and neutralizes viruses upon surface contact with the positive and negative electrodes. The charged CCSC device yielded a 6-log CFU reduction of Escherichia coli bacterial inocula and a 5-log PFU reduction of HSV-1 herpes virus. Antibacterial and antiviral carbon cloth supercapacitors represent a promising platform technology for various applications, including electronic textiles and electronic skins, health monitoring or motion sensors, wound dressings, personal protective equipment (e.g., masks) and air filtration systems.

Biofouling on surfaces, caused by the assimilation of proteins, peptides, lipids and microorganisms, leads to contamination, deterioration and failure of biomedical devices and causes implants rejection. To address these issues, various antifouling strategies have been extensively studied, including polyethylene glycol-based polymer brushes. Conducting polymers-based biointerfaces have emerged as advanced surfaces for interfacing biological tissues and organs with electronics. Antifouling of such biointerfaces is a challenge. In this study, we fabricated electrospun fibre mats from sulphonated polystyrene-block-poly(ethylene-ran-butylene)-block-polystyrene (sSEBS), infused with conducting polymer poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) (PEDOT) (sSEBS-PEDOT), to produce a conductive (2.06 ± 0.1 S/cm), highly porous, fibre mat that can be used as a biointerface in bioelectronic applications. To afford antifouling, here the poly(oligo (ethylene glycol) methyl ether methacrylate) (POEGMA) brushes were grafted onto the sSEBS-PEDOT conducting fibre mats via surface-initiated atom transfer radical polymerization technique (SI-ATRP). For that, a copolymer of EDOT and an EDOT derivative with SI-ATRP initiating sites, 3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) methyl 2-bromopropanoate (EDOTBr), was firstly electropolymerized on the sSEBS-PEDOT fibre mat to provide sSEBS-PEDOT/P(EDOT-co-EDOTBr). The POEGMA brushes were grafted from the sSEBS-PEDOT/P(EDOT-co-EDOTBr) and the polymerization kinetics confirmed the successful growth of the brushes. Fibre mats with 10-mers and 30-mers POEGMA brushes were studied for antifouling using a BCA protein assay. The mats with 30-mers grafted brushes exhibited excellent antifouling efficiency, ~82% of proteins repelled, compared to the pristine sSEBS-PEDOT fibre mat. The grafted fibre mats exhibited cell viability >80%, comparable to the standard cell culture plate controls. Such conducting, porous biointerfaces with POEGMA grafted brushes are suitable for applications in various biomedical devices, including biosensors, liquid biopsy, wound healing substrates and drug delivery systems.

Highly stretchable and flexible symmetrical supercapacitors are constructed from conductive polymer-infused electrospun microfibers and freeze/thawed PVA-H₂SO₄ gel electrolyte.

Electrochemical techniques offer great opportunities for the capture of chemical and biological entities from complex mixtures and their subsequent release into clean buffers for analysis. Such methods are clean, robust, rapid, and compatible with a wide range of biological fluids. Here, we designed an electrochemically addressable system, based on a conducting terpolymer [P(EDOT-co-EDOTSAc-co-EDOTEG)] coated onto a carbon cloth substrate, to selectively capture and release biological entities using a simple electrochemical redox process. The conducting terpolymer composition was optimized and the terpolymer-coated carbon cloth was extensively characterized using electrochemical analysis, Raman and Fourier transform-infrared spectroscopy, water contact angle analysis, and scanning electron microscopy. The conductive terpolymer possesses a derivative of EDOT with an acetylthiomethyl moiety (EDOTSAc), which is converted into a "free" thiol that then undergoes reversible oxidation/reduction cycles at +1.0 V and -0.8 V (vs Ag/AgCl), respectively. That redox process enables electrochemical capture and on-demand release. We first demonstrated the successful electrochemical capture/release of a fluorescently labeled IgG antibody. The same capture/release procedure was then applied to release extracellular vesicles (EVs), originating from both MCF7 and SKBR3 breast cancer cell line bioreactors. EVs were captured using the substrate-conjugated HER2 antibody which was purified from commercially available trastuzumab. Capture and release of breast cancer EVs using a trastuzumab-derived HER2 antibody has not been reported before (to the best of our knowledge). A rapid (2 min) release at a low potential (-0.8 V) achieved a high release efficiency (>70%) of the captured, HER2^+ve, SKBR3 EVs. The developed system and the electrochemical method are efficient and straightforward and have vast potential for the isolation and concentration of various biological targets from large volumes of biological and other (e.g., environmental) samples.