Electrospinning Machine | Iontransport-triggered rapid flexible hydrovoltaic sensing

Challenge: The hydrovoltaic effect based on solid-liquid interface interactions provides a promising pathway for ion sensing. However, due to the slow ion diffusion equilibrium in nanochannels, the response time is long, typically requiring several minutes. 

Method: Researcher Zhang Ting and Associate Researcher Li Lianhui's team at the Suzhou Institute of Nano-Tech and Nano-Bionics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, proposed a new hydrovoltaic sensing strategy based on rapid ion transport. This technology significantly improves ion detection speed and sensitivity by optimizing nanochannel structure, eliminating gravity influence, and introducing a low-resistance shear flow mechanism in the liquid-liquid transport zone. 

Innovation 1: In addition to ordered nanochannels reducing resistance and gravity elimination along the nanochannel direction, a liquid driving effect of low-resistance shear flow in the liquid-liquid transport zone within semi-dry nanochannels was proposed, achieving an open-circuit voltage exceeding 4.0 V within 0.17 s, which is two orders of magnitude faster than previous osmotic channel work. 

Innovation 2: The obtained flexible hydrovoltaic device has a wide ion sensing range of 10−7 to 100 M, a maximum sensitivity of −1.69 V dec-1 for NaCl, and unique multidimensional signals, which can be used for selective ion sensing and sweat electrolyte monitoring. 

http://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-63549-1