Liquid Metal Functionalization Innovations in Wearables and Soft Robotics for Smart Healthcare Applications

Smart healthcare solutions are crucial for early diagnosis, real-time health monitoring, and personalized therapy. Essential to these advancements are flexible wearable devices and medical robotics, which incorporate a range of elements, including soft sensors, therapeutic modules, human-machine interfaces, actuators, and systems for communication, computation, and power. Liquid metal-based materials are rapidly emerging as one of the key elements for these innovations. This review will delve into the latest breakthroughs in liquid metal (LM) functionalization innovation and the applications in healthcare-related wearables and soft robotics. Firstly, techniques to modify LM are explored, emphasizing strategies to enhance properties such as electromechanical, thermal, electromagnetic, biochemical, self-healing, and magnetic capabilities. Next, the authors shed light on contemporary wearable sensors, therapeutic on-skin devices, and other flexible device innovations. They finally conclude by highlighting the challenges and charting the path forward for LM-driven healthcare advances. Liquid metal-based functional materials provide unprecedented potential in flexible wearable devices and medical robotics for smart healthcare. This review overviews the latest breakthroughs in liquid metal functionalization strategies, focousing on specific physical and biochemical properties and the applications in healthcare-related wearables and soft robotics. Finally, the challenges and promising directions in this area are discussed.image