Flexible Polydopamine Bioelectronics

Flexible bioelectronics have attracted increasing research interests due to their wide range of potential applications in human motion detection, personal healthcare monitoring, and medical diagnosis. Recently, design and fabrication strategies integrated with mussel-inspired polydopamine (PDA) have demonstrated many appealing properties, which meet the structural and functional requirements of high-performance flexible bioelectronics. The inherent multiple reactive sites and hierarchical interactions within PDA can promote the total electrochemical activities, self-healing, surface activation, and biocompatibility of the composite system. This review paper strives to provide a comprehensive overview on this emerging area, including the fabrication methodology, the structural and functional contributions of PDA on the whole composites, and various applications of PDA-based flexible bioelectronics. The current challenges and future outlook in this field are also extensively discussed at the end. This paper aims to serve as a guideline in this emerging area and provide new inspirations toward next-generation integrated multifunctional flexible PDA bioelectronics with a broad range of healthcare applications.

Automated summary

Flexible bioelectronics utilizing mussel-inspired polydopamine with multiple reactive sites and hierarchical interactions can enhance overall electrochemical activity, self-healing ability, and biocompatibility. This research overview covers fabrication methods, structural and functional contributions of PDA in composite materials, and various applications of PDA-based flexible bioelectronics.