Advances in the Use of Conducting Polymers for Healthcare Monitoring

Conducting polymers (CPs) are an innovative class of materials recognized for their high flexibility and biocompatibility, making them an ideal choice for health monitoring applications that require flexibility. They are active in their design. Advances in fabrication technology allow the incorporation of CPs at various levels, by combining diverse CPs monomers with metal particles, 2D materials, carbon nanomaterials, and copolymers through the process of polymerization and mixing. This method produces materials with unique physicochemical properties and is highly customizable. In particular, the development of CPs with expanded surface area and high conductivity has significantly improved the performance of the sensors, providing high sensitivity and flexibility and expanding the range of available options. However, due to the morphological diversity of new materials and thus the variety of characteristics that can be synthesized by combining CPs and other types of functionalities, choosing the right combination for a sensor application is difficult but becomes important. This review focuses on classifying the role of CP and highlights recent advances in sensor design, especially in the field of healthcare monitoring. It also synthesizes the sensing mechanisms and evaluates the performance of CPs on electrochemical surfaces and in the sensor design. Furthermore, the applications that can be revolutionized by CPs will be discussed in detail.

Multiresponsive Behavior of Functional Poly(p-phenylene vinylene)s in Water

The multiresponsive behavior of functionalized water-soluble conjugated polymers (CPs) is presented with potential applications for sensors. In this study, we investigated the aqueous solubility behavior of water-soluble CPs with high photoluminescence and with a particular focus on their pH and temperature responsiveness. For this purpose, two poly(phenylene vinylene)s (PPVs)-namely 2,5-substituted PPVs bearing both carboxylic acid and methoxyoligoethylene glycol units-were investigated, with different amount of carboxylic acid units. Changes in the pH and temperature of polymer solutions led to a response in the fluorescence intensity in a pH range from 3 to 10 and for temperatures ranging from 10 to 85 °C. Additionally, it is demonstrated that the polymer with the largest number of carboxylic acid groups displays upper critical solution temperature (UCST)-like thermoresponsive behavior in the presence of a divalent ion like Ca2+. The sensing capability of these water-soluble PPVs could be utilized to design smart materials with multiresponsive behavior in biomedicine and soft materials.