To ensure the durability of wearable devices, there is a growing demand for materials that can rapidly self-heal even after physical damage. Herein, we report a fully self-healable, high-performance, and flexible microsupercapacitor (MSC) enabled by a...
To ensure the durability of wearable devices, there is a growing demand for materials that can rapidly self-heal even after physical damage. Herein, we report a fully self-healable, high-performance, and flexible microsupercapacitor (MSC) enabled by a novel MXene-based ionohydrogel electrolyte designed for skin-attachable wearable electronics. The ionohydrogel was designed based on the Schiff-base reaction and abundant hydrogen bond for fast self-healing. The Schiff-base reaction occurs between the amide group of acrylamide (AAm) and the aldehyde group of benzene-1,3,5-tricarbaldehyde (BTA), while hydrogen bonding between AAm and acrylic acid also contributes to self-healing. Because the MXene-induced photothermal effect rapidly activates and reforms these dynamic bonds, an ultrafast self-healing ionohydrogel could be synthesized. It achieves self-healing efficiency of 91.0% within 1 minute under 808 nm irradiation. MXene served a dual role in the ionohydrogel, functioning as both an inorganic filler and a photothermal agent. As a filler, MXene increased the ionic conductivity by approximately 60% compared with the MXene-free system.
To fabricate a fully self-healable microsupercapacitor, an aniline-trimer-based polyurethane (AT-PU) with photothermal functionality was used as both the substrate and encapsulation layer. AT-PU can completely heal within 3 minutes under the same NIR laser conditions, and by integrating it with the ionohydrogel, an MSC capable of fully self-healing within 3 minutes was achieved. As a result, the MSC restored 100% and 85.7% of its capacitance after the first and fifth healing cycles, respectively. The ionohydrogel was also used as a strain sensor, and body-motion signals were successfully detected using the MSC as the power source. This demonstrates a robust platform for fully self-healable and multifunctional wearable energy storage systems.