Bioinspired Antiswelling Hydrogel Sensors with High Strength and Rapid Self-Recovery for Underwater Information Transmission

作者：Shenxin Pan, Chao Chang, Gang Wu, Zidong He, Chongyin Zhang, Shuqiang Xiong, Gangsheng Tong, Xinyuan Zhu · 发表于：ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces · 年份：2025 · DOI：10.1021/acsami.4c17863 · 被引用次数：24 · 研究领域：Advanced Sensor and Energy Harvesting Materials、Advanced Materials and Mechanics、Hydrogels: synthesis, properties, applications

Hydrogel-based sensors typically demonstrate conspicuous swelling behavior in aqueous environments, which can severely compromise the mechanical integrity and distort sensing signals, thereby considerably constraining their widespread applicability. Drawing inspiration from the multilevel heterogeneous structures in biological tissues, an antiswelling hydrogel sensor endowed with high strength, rapid self-recovery, and low swelling ratio was fabricated through a water-induced phase separation and coordination cross-linking strategy. A dense heterogeneous architecture was developed by the integration of “rigid” quadridentate carboxyl–Zr 4+ coordination bonds and “soft” hydrophobic unit-rich regions featuring π–π stacking and cation–π interactions into the hydrogels. This unique structural design facilitated the progressive breaking of cross-links within the hydrogel network from “soft” to “rigid” under external loads, effectively dissipating energy and thereby imparting the hydrogels with exceptional mechanical characteristics, evidenced by a strength of 1.42 MPa, and complete self-recovery within 3 min. Simultaneously, the “rigid” and “soft” dynamic interactions synergistically conferred augmented elastic retractive forces on the hydrogel network by enhancing cross-linking density, thereby providing the hydrogels with prominent antiswelling capabilities in water (with a swelling ratio of only −2.49%), in solutions with diverse pH (1–9), and in seawater. Moreover, the hydrogel...