Good day to our readers,

Concerns about our environment and saving planet Earth are by no means new. Environmental activists have been preaching for decades and global movements like turning off lights on Earth day are being widely adopted. This trend has also been appreciated in the research community.

In line with this spirit, I picked out a paper that made hydrogels from cellulose - the same material in plant fibers. Hope that our readers will enjoy yet another edition of our newsletter.

In Brief

• How plant-derived hydrogels are deployed as printable materials

Research Updates

An effective DLP 3D printing strategy of high strength and toughness cellulose hydrogel towards strain sensing

• The researchers developed a printable hydrogel that can effectively facilitate various solid or hollow structures and even lattice structures.

• The chemical and physical dual-crosslinking strategy combined with cellulose nanofibers (CNF) significantly improved the strength and toughness of photocurable 3D printed hydrogels

• The authors chose to use cellulose nanofibers (CNF) in their 3D printing strategy because it significantly improved the strength and toughness of photocurable 3D printed hydrogels. The introduction of CNF enriched the hydrogen bonding between CNF and polymer chains, and the entanglements between CNFs and the polymer chains would be a substantial assist to achieve appreciable mechanical properties . This allowed the hydrogels to have excellent mechanical performance and flexibility.

• The proposed hydrogel can be utilized as a flexible strain sensor to monitor the motions of human movements, such as the bending of fingers, wrists, and arms, and even the vibration of a speaking throat.

• Photocurable 3D printing technology can provide customized services for hydrogel-based e-skin, such as hydrogel-based bracelets, fingerstall, and finger joint sleeves.

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