News

Differentiating contribution to desolvation ability from molecular structure and composition for screening highly-effective additives to boost reversibility of zinc metal anode

Dr. Jimin FU and collaborators (Prof. Haibo HU from Anhui University, China and etc.) optimize aqueous electrolytes with additives to postpone dendrite formation on Zn metal anode (ZMA) and therefore boost rechargeability of full zinc metal batteries (ZMBs). The research was published in Volume 55, Energy Storage Materials (DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ensm.2022.12.030).   Herein, thiourea, urea, and allantoin are investigated as additives to regulate ZnSO4 baseline electrolyte. By combining systematical electrochemical measurements with detailed numerical simulation analysis, two fundamental principles for screening the additives with stronger desolvation ability toward hydrated zinc ions have been identified: (i) in molecular composition, carbonyl (urea) is better than thiocarbonyl (thiourea), and (ii) in molecular structure, bidentate coordination mode (allantoin) outperforms monodentate mode (urea). Consequently, an electrostripping/plating lifespan over 600 h in the Zn||Zn symmetric cell cycling under a depth of discharge up to 5.2% is realized with the optimum allantoin-ZnSO4 hybrid electrolyte, significantly boosting the rechargeability (85.7% capacity retention over 2000 cycles) of assembled ZMA||carbon-cloth@MnO2 full ZMBs than that with additive-free ZnSO4 electrolyte (40.5%).   This work provides closer insights into the correlation between desirable dendrite-free behavior of ZMA and molecular characteristics of additives, and practical guidance for rational selection of more efficient additives to inhibit hydration of Zn2+ and suppress dendrite grown on ZMA.

Prof. Yang CHAI’s Research Recognised in the Top 10 Hong Kong Innovative Technology News 2022

Prof. Yang CHAI, a member of RI-IWEAR, collaborated with the researchers at Yonsei University in Seoul and has developed new bioinspired sensors that may offer a solution by directly adapting different light intensities by the sensors. The human eye adapts to different levels of illumination, from very dark to very bright and vice versa, which allows us to identify objects accurately under a range of lighting conditions. The new sensors aim to mimic this adaptability. This work recognised in the Top 10 Hong Kong Innovative Technology News 2022.   “The Top 10 Hong Kong Innovative Technology News 2022” organized by the Beijing-Hong Kong Academic Exchange Centre has been launched in late November 2022. Universities in Hong Kong were invited to support and provide local science and technology innovation and scientific research news. The Advisory Board composed of academicians in Hong Kong from the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Chinese Academy of Engineering Sciences selected thirty of the most influential news for public voting. In the end, a total of 3,360 netizens was involved in the voting and the results were announced at the end of 2022.   The research was published in Nature Electronics.   The list of the Top 10 Hong Kong Innovative Technology News 2022 (Chinese Only)

Professor Zijian Zheng was Awarded Research Impact Fund 2022/23

Prof. Zijian ZHENG, Associate Director of Research Institute for Intelligent Wearable Systems, as Project Coordinators was supported by the RGC Research Impact Fund 2022/23 with a total amount of $5.55 M (exclusive of on-costs) for the project titled ‘Flexible and Stretchable Batteries for Wearable Applications’ for a period of 48 months.   The Research Impact Fund (RIF) aims to encourage local academics to consider and articulate the potential of research to deliver benefits to the wider community, encourage more impactful and translational research projects; and encourage a greater volume of collaborative research beyond academia (e.g. with government departments, the business sector, the industry, and research institutes). In the 2022/23 Exercise, the RGC received 127 preliminary proposals, 48 proposals were shortlisted for submission as full proposals and 18 proposals were selected for interview. Finally, 13 proposals were supported with a total amount of $75 million (exclusive of on-costs).   Congratulations to Prof. Zheng awarded Research Impact Fund in the 2022/23 Exercise!

Wearable System with Adaptive Cooling and Heating for Sport Recovery- COOLWEAR

Prof. Xiaoming TAO, Director of RI-IWEAR, and Prof. Amy FU,  recently secured approximately HK$7 million under the Sports Science and Research Funding Scheme for a 2-year research project entitled “Wearable System with Adaptive Cooling and Heating for Sport Recovery- COOLWEAR”.   Rapid contrast-temperature therapy (RCT) with water immersion has been used by elite sportsmen for faster recovery after competition and performance enhancement in the following match. The sharp contrast in water temperature facilitates fast heat transfer from or to the human body and promotes vasodilation thus increasing the metabolism of lactate, and speed up muscle and psychological recovery.   On the field, the required cold-hot water immersion cycles are achieved by the athletes jumping into two separate containers in a sequential manner. The process is inconvenient for the athletes. These bulky devices require a large space, thus cumbersome in setting up and transportation. Personal hygiene is also a concern if sharing water containers with multiple users.   In the contrast, a lightweight, flexible wearable system is much more desirable for on-field applications where a large space and AC power supply are not readily available. The wearable system shall provide the rapid heat transfer to realize the required temperature contrast, identical to those used in the water immersion method while maintaining a similar hydraulic pressure. The dry personalized wearables are much more convenient to use and to set up with no hygienic concerns. Up-to-date, no commercial system for an on-field application can offer the required RCT function.   The interdisciplinary team aims to develop a first-of-the-kind, convenient, smart, and personalized wearable COOLWEAR system that provides active RCT together with compression, which targets on-field applications for elite athletes’ competitions, in order to achieve fast sports recovery, enhance performance and reduce injury.   The wearable system shall comprise at least the energy transfer, close-loop control, and power supply units. Technically, the biggest challenge is a large amount of heat energy to be transferred between the human body and the fabric-based wearable system within a short time of several seconds, the heat power alone being estimated in hundreds of watts. The mechanical, hydraulic, and control units have to be highly efficient with a limited electric energy supply.  To reach an even spatial distribution of the required temperature within a large fabric surface is also a huddle. There have been no established analytic methods as well as no engineering design tool for such hydraulic heat-transfer textile devices as well as garments. Fabrication of such devices required streamlining and optimization of several textile and garment processing technologies.  The project will deliver new analytical and design tools based on an engineering scientific foundation for such function textile/garment.   Multi-domain recovery will be evaluated which includes muscle tone characteristics, sleep, heart rate variability, and self-anticipated effectiveness. The personalized protocol will be selected by considering the needs and sizes of the athletes and the responses from the recovery markers.

Prof. Xiaoming TAO Published an Invited Review Article in Natural Sustainability

Natural Sustainability, a top journal of the field, published an invited review article entitled “Advancing life-cycle sustainability of textiles through technological innovations”, which was released online on 22 December 2022 (https://doi.org/10.1038/s41893-022-01004-5). An international team led by Prof. Xiaoming Tao of Hong Kong Polytechnic University was the contributing authors.   Throughout their life cycle, textiles produce 5–10% of global greenhouse gas emissions and consume the second-largest amount of the world’s water with polluting microplastics and chemical agents released to waterways. Prof. Tao’s team and Dr. Svetlana Boriskina of Massachusetts Institute of Technology have joined forces and spent two years together to study technology innovations and their impacts on sustainability. The team examined the state-of-the-art technology developments meant to solve these problems in a cradle-to-grave fashion.  They collected 22724 publications during the last ten years, among which 940 were screened and 215 were studied in detail.  The team analysed their impacts with respect to the Sustainable Development Goals in United Nations Agenda 2030, particularly those concerning the deployment of natural resources, energy and environmental impacts. A systematic analytical framework was followed to identify and elucidate impactful technologies.   Based on the findings, the team further discussed future directions of research and developments along which the green transformation of textiles could be accelerated. The topics cover: green sciences and processes based on high-throughput, data-driven discovery studies to identify and develop sustainable replacements for synthetic polyester and nylon fibres, biomass-based and degradable fibre–forming materials and the cultivation of insect- and disease-resistant plant seeds that require less water can be achieved through advancements in biological science, waterless or less-water colouration, reduction or elimination of production steps as well as mono-materiality in textiles for proactive material recovery.   The first author is Dr. Lisha Zhang, Research Assistant Professor. Prof. Xiaoming Tao is the corresponding author.

RI-IWEAR members visited the Hong Kong Science & Technology Parks Corporation

RI-IWEAR actively builds external collaborative partnerships with local research institutions. A visit to the Hong Kong Science & Technology Parks Corporation (HKSTP) on 12 December 2022 was arranged. A total of 44 RI-IWEAR members, colleagues from Industrial Centre, and research students from PolyU participated in this activity.   Dr Carmen FUNG, Associate Director of Strategic Development of HKSTP gave a welcome speech. Ms Candy CHENG, Manager of Strategic Development, and Dr Horace LEUNG, Manager of Industry Development, introduced the Heterogeneous Lab and Microelectronics Centre (MEC) located at Yuen Long INNOPARK, respectively. MEC is established to support the development and pilot production of new generation micro-electronics products with flexible design dedicated cleanrooms and special chemical handling facilities. After the introduction of the facilities related to the microelectronics industry, PolyU members were given a guided tour of the Biomedical Technology Support Centre, The Sensor Packaging and Integration Laboratory (Sensor Lab) and the Medical Device Testing Lab at HKSTP.

RI-IWEAR Members Visited Hong Kong Productivity Council

A total of 28 RI-IWEAR members and colleagues from Industrial Centre of PolyU visited the Smart Wearables, Watch & Clock Technology Centre and Advanced Electronics Processing Technology Centre of the Hong Kong Productivity Council (HKPC) on 6 December 2022.   Smart Wearables, Watch and Clock Technology Centre established with the ITF funding of the Hong Kong SAR Government on Oct 2022, is the first and only platform in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region to offer testing and verification of prototypes of smart wearables, watches and clocks. During the visit, the colleagues from the Smart Manufacturing Section of HKPC mainly introduced the smart wearable testing services, including the performance testing of devices for measuring steps, heart rates, blood pressure, and oxygen content in blood, and briefly show the over 50 different independent testing services for traditional quartz and mechanical watches in compliance with international & Swiss standards.   Furthermore, a new showroom with last manufacturing products and equipment of a new centre which provided services in the areas of electronics and advanced manufacturing was visited. After the visit to the facilities of the two centres, Mr Samson SUEN, General Manager, Smart Manufacturing of HKPC, introduced the organisation, facilities of the centres and the research projects under the Smart Manufacturing Section. Members actively discussed the potential PolyU–HKPC collaboration and future direction.

Three RI-IWEAR Members Recognised Amongst the World’s Most Highly Cited Researchers in 2022

Three RI-IWEAR members, Dr Bolong HUANG, Prof. Gang LI, and Prof. Feng Yan have been recognised in the list of “Highly Cited Researchers 2022” by Clarivate Analytics for their significant research impact, reflected in their publication of multiple papers that have been frequently cited by fellow academics.   A total of 6,938 researchers from 69 countries and regions with a diverse range of research fields are named as Highly Cited Researchers in 2022. The list identifies the most influential scholars around the world, determined by the production of multiple highly cited papers that rank in the top 1% by citations for field and year in the Web of Science citation index over the last decade. Congratulations to our colleagues on their high ranking and impact! RI-IWEAR's Scholars Ranked in the Top 1% by Citations  Name (by alphabetical order of surname)  Category  Dr Bolong HUANG  Cross-Field  Prof. Gang LI  Cross-Field  Prof. Feng YAN  Cross-Field

Two RI-IWEAR Scholars were Funding Supported by NSFC/RGC Collaborative Research Scheme 2022/23

The National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) and the Research Grants Council (RGC) of Hong Kong Collaborative Research Scheme (CRS) aims to support larger-scale collaborative research across disciplines and / or across universities in the Mainland and Hong Kong, with a view to enhancing research output and impact on both sides. The Scheme aims to support research projects with duration of four years.    Two full proposals submitted by RI-IWEAR members, Prof. Yang CHAI and Prof. Zijian ZHENG, have been agreed to provide funding support with a total awarded amount of HK$ 7.164 million(i.e., 20.80% of total awarded funding) under these scheme. The focus areas of these two projects are Information Technology and New Materials Science.   Awarded Project in Collaborative Research Scheme 2022/23 Project Title Focus Area Hong Kong Project Coordinator Funding Period (months) Amount Awarded by RGC (HK$) Monolithically Integrated Electronics with Two-Dimensional Semiconductors from Controllable Growth to Device Integration Information Technology Prof. Yang CHAI 48 3,571,200 Long-cycle and High-energy-density Flexible Li Batteries Using Hollow Multishelled Structure and Hierarchical Composite Electrode New Materials Science Prof. Zijian ZHENG 48 3,592,800   Congratulations to our members!

RI-IWEAR Member's Publication was Selected as The Inside Front Cover Article in Advanced Functional Materials

Developing conductive underwater glue for fast sealing and in situ monitoring is critical for ocean exploration yet remains a challenge. The fluidity of glue is a double-edged sword that is favorable for molecule spreading and formation of interlocking bonding network yet also leads to leakage of conductive ions. Dr Jimin FU, member of RI-IWEAR, and collaborators (Si Yu Zheng, Jintao Yang, and etc.) design a polymeric glue based on triazole-beared macromolecules and ionic liquids, which is possessing good conductivity and exhibiting rapid, strong, and long-lasting underwater adhesion on diverse substrates at various harsh environments and extreme temperatures. Furthermore, the glue possesses additional functions of underwater sensing and fluorescent labeling, which exhibits great potentials in underwater repair and follow-up crack monitoring. In molecular design, the nitrogen heterocyclic motif that prevails in biomolecular recognition is encoded with water-resistant benzene block in one pendant group to serve as underwater binding sites; ionic liquids (ILs) of [EMIM][BF4] is employed as the solvent for fast water exchange that triggers rapid adhesion. Simultaneously, the polymer-IL interaction is regulated, with the assistance of the theoretical calculations, to retain sufficient ILs within the adhesive for sensing. Finally, the glue is applied for underwater sealing and in situ monitoring various physical signals, while the fluorescent property is utilized for underwater labeling. This study should provide a new design strategy for the next-generation of multifunctional underwater adhesives and promote their applications. This research was published in Advanced Functional Materials and selected as the inside front cover article.