Body’s Sugar Transforms Cocktail Gel Into Electrodes Grown in Living Zebrafish; Experiment Could Improve Human-Machine Interfaces
Scientists have transformed sugar into an electrical conductor to create a new type of gel electrode for use in biological experiments. The research was conducted by a team of researchers from the University of Chicago and is described in a recent paper published in the journal Advanced Materials.
The gel electrode was made by mixing glucose, a type of sugar, with a conductive polymer known as poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) or PEDOT. When the mixture was heated, the glucose molecules underwent a chemical reaction that transformed them into a conductive material that could be used as an electrode.
“We were able to create a highly conductive gel electrode using a simple and inexpensive chemical process,” said Bozhi Tian, an associate professor of chemistry at the University of Chicago and senior author of the study. “This could have important implications for a wide range of biological experiments, including the study of neural circuits and the development of new medical devices.”
The researchers tested the gel electrodes by growing them on living zebrafish embryos, which served as a model system for studying the development of neural circuits. They found that the electrodes were able to record neural activity in the developing fish with high sensitivity and accuracy.
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