Vurro Davide, Liboà Aris, D'Onofrio Ilenia, De Giorgio Giuseppe, Scaravonati Silvio, Crepaldi Marco, Barcellona Alessandro, Sciancalepore Corrado, Galstyan Vardan, Milanese Daniel, Riccò Mauro, D'Angelo Pasquale, Tarabella Giuseppe
Institute of Materials for Electronics and Magnetism (IMEM-CNR), Parco Area delle Scienze 37/A, Parma 43124, Italy.
Department of Chemistry Life Sciences and Environmental Sustainability, University of Parma, Parco Area delle Scienze 17/A, Parma 43124, Italy.
ACS Biomater Sci Eng. 2025 Mar 10;11(3):1776-1791. doi: 10.1021/acsbiomaterials.4c02234. Epub 2025 Feb 4.
The combination of green manufacturing approaches and bioinspired materials is growingly emerging in different scenarios, in particular in medicine, where widespread medical devices (MDs) as commercial electrodes for electrophysiology strongly increase the accumulation of solid waste after use. Electrocardiogram (ECG) electrodes exploit electrolytic gels to allow the high-quality recording of heart signals. Beyond their nonrecyclability/nonrecoverability, gel drying also affects the signal quality upon prolonged monitoring of biopotentials. Moreover, gel composition often causes skin reactions. This study aims to address the above limitation by presenting a composite based on the combination of silk sericin (SS) as a structural material, poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) as a robustness enhancer, and CaCl as a plasticizer. SS/PVA/CaCl formulations, optimized in terms of weight content (wt %) of single constituents, result in a biocompatible, biodegradable "green" material (free from potentially irritating cross-linking agents) that is, above all, self-adhesive on skin. The best formulation, i.e., SS(4 wt %)/PVA(4 wt %)/CaCl(20 wt %), in terms of long-lasting skin adhesion (favored by calcium-ion coordination in the presence of environmental/skin humidity) and time-stability of electrode impedance, is used to assemble ECG electrodes showing quality trace recording over longer time scales (up to 6 h) than commercial electrodes. ECG recording is performed using customized electronics coupled to an app for data visualization.
绿色制造方法与仿生材料的结合在不同场景中日益兴起,尤其是在医学领域。在医学领域,作为电生理学商业电极的广泛使用的医疗设备(MDs)在使用后会大幅增加固体废物的积累。心电图(ECG)电极利用电解凝胶来实现心脏信号的高质量记录。除了不可回收/不可恢复外,凝胶干燥在长时间监测生物电位时也会影响信号质量。此外,凝胶成分常常会引起皮肤反应。本研究旨在通过提出一种基于丝胶蛋白(SS)作为结构材料、聚乙烯醇(PVA)作为强度增强剂以及氯化钙(CaCl)作为增塑剂的复合材料来解决上述限制。根据单一成分的重量百分比(wt%)进行优化的SS/PVA/CaCl配方,得到了一种生物相容、可生物降解的“绿色”材料(不含潜在刺激性的交联剂),最重要的是,它能在皮肤上实现自粘贴。就持久的皮肤粘附性(在环境/皮肤湿度存在下受钙离子配位作用的促进)和电极阻抗的时间稳定性而言,最佳配方,即SS(4 wt%)/PVA(4 wt%)/CaCl(20 wt%),被用于组装心电图电极,该电极在比商业电极更长的时间尺度(长达6小时)上显示出高质量的轨迹记录。使用与用于数据可视化的应用程序相连的定制电子设备进行心电图记录。