Bioinspired hierarchically structured liquid metal-composited eutectogel for energy conversion and intelligent perception

Bioinspired hierarchical structure engineering enables high-performance eutectogels. • Hierarchical gel networks show low hysteresis (10.71% dissipation at 500% strain). • Liquid metal-composited eutectogels achieve high conductivity (31.19 mS cm −1 ). • Ionic gradient converts low-grade waste heat and mechanical energy into electricity. • Excellent signal reproducibility enables high-accuracy (99.5%) gesture recognition. Balancing mechanical properties and electrical conductivity is a critical challenge in the development of flexible conductive gel materials. Inspired by the hierarchical structure of brain's blood vessels and neural networks, which enables synergistic trade-offs among multiple properties, we developed a structural biomimetic strategy to create liquid metal (LM)-initiated polymerizable deep eutectic solvents (PDES) eutectogels. In this design, the polymerizable hydrogen bond donor forms polymer chains that provide mechanical support akin to vascular networks, while the hydrogen bond acceptor enables ion transport for signal transmission, analogous to neurotransmitter-mediated communication. LM acts as a “growth factor” that introduces ionic coordination bonds to construct a hierarchical supramolecular network, serves as a conductive filler to establish ion-electron pathways, and promotes acceptor dissociation via interfacial modification. Consequently, the resulting eutectogels achieve a balanced combination of mechanical strength, ultrastretchability ((451.8 kPa, 1106%), ~7-fold increase in tensile strength over LM-free PDES eutectogels), low hysteresis (energy dissipation ratio: 10.71% at 500% strain), and excellent ionic conductivity (~31.19 mS cm −1 ). This strategy effectively overcomes the practical application limitations of PDES eutectogels arising from their insufficient mechanical performance and low ionic conductivity. Furthermore, based on this platform, a “dynamic-static” self-powered system enables low-grade heat and mechanical energy conversion into electricity while serving as a supercapacitor (SC) electrolyte for energy storage. Integrated with a convolutional neural network (CNN), the PDES-LM 20 eutectogel enabled multi-channel gesture recognition with 99.5% accuracy for ten gestures. This work bridges structural biomimicry and functional synergy, advancing integrated gel platforms for energy conversion, storage, and intelligent perception. Inspired by brain vascular–neural synergy, LM acts as a “growth factor” to induce PDES polymerization and hierarchical network formation in PDES-LM x eutectogels. Polymerizable hydrogen bond donors provide mechanical support, while hydrogen bond acceptors enable signal transmission through ion transport. By integrating hierarchical supramolecular interactions with LM-mediated ion-electron conductive pathways, the eutectogel achieves strong synergy between mechanical stability and high conductivity, enabling efficient energy conversion, storage and highly accurate gesture recognition for intelligent perception. Download: Download high-res image (196KB) Download: Download full-size image