Antibacterial and Stretchable 3D Print Hydrogel for Recognizing Stimuli of Physiological Signals

As a new flexible electronic device, hydrogel sensors express unique value in biomedical, wearable, and smart medical fields. However, hydrogel sensors achieve high sensitivity while supporting bacterial growth, increasing the risk of human infection and shortening the service life of hydrogel sensors. Thus, a conductive antibacterial hydrogel sensor based on polyvinyl alcohol-sodium alginate dual network structure was designed and prepared by freeze–thaw method. The polyhexamethylene-biguanide was introduced into hydrogel with excellent antibacterial effect and antibacterial stability of 7 days for Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria. Meanwhile, the remarkable fracture strain (325%) and stress (226 kPa) of hydrogels can create complex three-dimensional structures as well as achieve 3D print effects. Moreover, the hydrogel can not only monitor human movement in real time (such as finger bending, vocalization, etc.), but also detect weak electromyographic signal. Therefore, the antibacterial property, fatigue resistance, and fast response of hydrogel sensor provide a theoretical basis for human health monitoring and the development of the next generation of intelligent medical devices. Graphical Application diagram of PPLS hydrogel.