Versatile carboxymethyl cellulose-based pH responsive hydrogel with robust mechanical strength, adhesion, and self-healing for motion monitoring and touchscreen interaction.

Authors

Durgesh Kumar Sinha, Nishikanta Singh, Onkarnath Verma, Sanjib Banerjee

Published in

Carbohydrate polymers. Volume 391. Pages 125849. Nov 01, 2026. Epub Sep 12, 2026.

Abstract

Hydrogels exhibiting functional properties like mechanical strength, self-healing ability, strong adhesion, and reliable sensing performance remains a major challenge for wearable electronics. Herein, a sustainable biomass-derived CPAT hydrogel was fabricated from carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC), poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA), acrylic acid (AA), and tannic acid (TA) through UV-induced polymerization and supramolecular crosslinking. The cooperative integration of a poly(ethylene glycol)diacrylate crosslinked poly(acrylic acid) (PAA-PEGDA) network with dynamic hydrogen-bonding interactions generated a robust multi-network architecture. This material exhibited good stretchability, high tensile strength, and toughness. Furthermore, the hydrogel demonstrated efficient self-healing with a healing efficiency exceeding 90%, an elastic recovery of approximately 90%, and 96% stress retention after repeated deformation cycles. The hydrogel displayed strong universal adhesion, pronounced pH-responsive swelling and sensing behaviour. Electrochemical impedance spectroscopy revealed an ionic conductivity of 3.33 × 10^--2 S cm^-1, while stable sensing performance was maintained over 1000 loading-unloading cycles. The hydrogel enabled real-time monitoring of human motions and good physiological activities, including swallowing and speech-related throat movements. The material exhibited excellent cytocompatibility, maintaining approximately 93% viability of L929 fibroblast cells. These results show the potential use of CPAT hydrogel as a multifunctional platform for wearable sensors, human-machine interfaces, and intelligent healthcare application.

PMID:
42785888
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 25 Sep 2026.

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