Flexible and stretchable bioelectronics inform cardiac health

Bioelectronics in the heart can identify diseased regions and enable targeted therapeutics. For example, pacemakers have long been used to treat cardiac diseases.

However, the heart is unlike other organs, as it is constantly contracting and expanding. Getting a long term, stable recording of activity is challenging, but necessary, to create accurate cardiac maps of healthy and diseased tissue.

Tang et al. reviewed the current state of soft bioelectronics, devices that can address this problem by moving with the heart.

“The first step is to make flexible bioelectronics. We have the capability to make the materials submicrometer thin, where they become very flexible,” said author Jia Liu. “The devices also need to be stretchable to accommodate the expansion of the heart.”

The team discussed the latest technology used for the devices, which includes coil-like structures with a high density of sensors that can expand to account for heart expansion, as well as devices made of intrinsically soft, rubberlike materials.

They covered applications like using bioelectronics for cellular therapy after a heart attack or other injury. Cultured cell patches can replace damaged regions of the heart but may beat at different frequencies than the organ. Integrating soft bioelectronics with the patch can pace the cells to beat at the same frequency as the heart.

Soft bioelectronics can also facilitate in vitro technology, helping cells develop outside the body and integrate smoothly within the heart without an immune response.

While the devices are still at an early stage, currently including hundreds to thousands of sensors, the researchers hope they can eventually gather millions of cell recordings at once.

Source: “Soft bioelectronics for cardiac interfaces,” by Xin Tang, Yichun He, and Jia Liu, Biophysics Reviews (2022). The article can be accessed at https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0069516 .