Tag Archives: University of Waterloo

Converting body heat into electricity with smart fabric

This bioenergy harvesting story is from the University of Waterloo (Ontario, Canada), where its researchers were part of an international collaboration. From an August 14, 2023 news item on ScienceDaily,

Imagine a coat that captures solar energy to keep you cozy on a chilly winter walk, or a shirt that can monitor your heart rate and temperature.Picture clothing athletes can wear to track their performance without the need for bulky battery packs.

University of Waterloo researchers have developed a smart fabric with these remarkable capabilities.

The fabric has the potential for energy harvesting, health monitoring, and movement tracking applications.

An August 14, 2024 University of Waterloo news release (also on EurekAlert), which originated the news item, provides more information about the new fabric and the research team, Note: A link has been removed,

The new fabric developed by a Waterloo research team can convert body heat and solar energy into electricity, potentially enabling continuous operation with no need for an external power source. Different sensors monitoring temperature, stress, and more can be integrated into the material.

It can detect temperature changes and a range of other sensors to monitor pressure, chemical composition, and more. One promising application is smart face masks that can track breath temperature and rate and detect chemicals in breath to help identify viruses, lung cancer, and other conditions.

“We have developed a fabric material with multifunctional sensing capabilities and self-powering potential,” said Yuning Li, a professor in the Department of Chemical Engineering. “This innovation brings us closer to practical applications for smart fabrics.”

Unlike current wearable devices that often depend on external power sources or frequent recharging, this breakthrough research has created a novel fabric which is more stable, durable, and cost-effective than other fabrics on the market. 

This research, conducted in collaboration with Professor Chaoxia Wang and PhD student Jun Peng from the College of Textile Science and Engineering at Jiangnan University, showcases the potential of integrating advanced materials such as MXene and conductive polymers with cutting-edge textile technologies to advance smart fabrics for wearable technology.

Li, director of Waterloo’s Printable Electronic Materials Lab, highlighted the significance of this advancement, which is the latest in the university’s suite of technologies disrupting health boundaries.

“AI technology is evolving rapidly, offering sophisticated signal analysis for health monitoring, food and pharmaceutical storage, environmental monitoring, and more. However, this progress relies on extensive data collection, which conventional sensors, often bulky, heavy, and costly, cannot meet,” Li said. “Printed sensors, including those embedded in smart fabrics, are ideal for continuous data collection and monitoring. This new smart fabric is a step forward in making these applications practical.”

The next phase of research will focus on further enhancing the fabric’s performance and integrating it with electronic components in collaboration with electrical and computer engineers. Future developments may include a smartphone app to track and transmit data from the fabric to healthcare professionals, enabling real-time, non-invasive health monitoring and everyday use.

Here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,

MXene-based thermoelectric fabric integrated with temperature and strain sensing for health monitoring by Jun Peng, Fangqing Ge, Weiyi Han, Tao Wu, Jinglei Tang, Yuning Li, Chaoxia Wang. Journal of Materials Science & Technology Volume 212, 20 March 2025, Pages 272-280

This paper is behind a paywall but you will be able to read snippets in a preview.

Painless, wearable patch for continuous smartphone monitoring of critical health data from Canadian researchers

A June 18, 2024 McMaster University news release also on EurekAlert and on the University of Waterloo news website) by Wade Hemsworth describes the ‘Wearable Aptalyzer’, Note: A link has been removed,

Researchers at two Ontario universities have developed a pain-free, wearable sensor that can continuously monitor levels of blood sugar, lactates and other critical health indicators for weeks at a time, sending results to a smartphone or other device.

The Wearable Aptalyzer, created by a team featuring researchers from McMaster University and the University of Waterloo, uses an array of tiny hydrogel needles that penetrate just deeply enough to reach the interstitial fluid beneath the skin, but not far enough to reach the blood vessels or nerves.

The patch gathers and sends information about markers in the fluid to an electronic device such as a smart phone, creating an ongoing record of patterns in the rise and fall of critical biomarkers.

Once developed for clinical use, it will allow health professionals to access current medical information that today is available only retrospectively after blood tests and lab work.

The new technology could make monitoring the markers of specific diseases and conditions as simple as tracking pulse, blood pressure and other vital signs. The researchers describe the work in a new paper published today [version of record published May 16, 2024] in the journal Advanced Materials.

“This technology can provide real-time information about both chronic and acute health conditions, allowing caregivers to act more quickly and with greater certainty when they see trouble,” says one of the paper’s two corresponding authors, McMaster’s Leyla Soleymani,  professor of Engineering Physics who holds the Canada Research Chair in Miniaturized Biomedical Devices.

“The Wearable Aptalyzer is a general platform, meaning it can measure any biomarkers of interest, ranging from diabetes to cardiac biomarkers,” says corresponding author Mahla Poudineh, an assistant professor and director of the IDEATION Lab in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Waterloo. “Continuous health monitoring doesn’t just help catch diseases early and track how treatments are working. It also helps us understand how diseases happen, filling in important gaps in our knowledge that need attention.”

A user would apply and remove the patch much like a small bandage held in place with barely visible, soft hooks. The convenience is likely to appeal to diabetics and others who test themselves by drawing samples of blood or by using solid monitoring patches with metal needles that penetrate deeper and rely on less specific electrodes.

The greatest promise of the technology, though, may lie in its ability to produce weeks’ worth of meaningful results at a time, and to transmit data to electronic devices experts can read without sophisticated equipment.

Among the other potential applications, the Wearable Aptalyzer can make it possible to read and send data that signals cardiac events in real time, making it a potentially valuable tool for monitoring patients in ambulances and emergency rooms, and during treatment. The same technology can readily be adapted to monitor the progress and treatment of many chronic illnesses, including cancers, the researchers say.

The technology holds promise for improving care use in remote care settings, such as northern Indigenous communities set far from hospitals, or on space flights. Data from the Wearable Aptalyzer can signal trouble before symptoms become apparent, making it more likely patients can receive timely care.

The next steps in developing the technology for broad use include human trials and regulatory approvals. The researchers are seeking partners to help commercialize the technology.

The paper’s lead authors are Fatemeh Bakhshandeh of McMaster and Hanjia Zheng of Waterloo. Together with Soleymani and Poudineh, their co-authors are Waterloo’s Sadegh Sadeghzadeh, Irfani Ausri, Fatemeh Keyvani, Fasih Rahman, Joe Quadrilatero, and Juewen Liu, and McMaster’s Nicole Barra, Payel Sen, and Jonathan Schertzer.

Caption: The monitoring patch as compared to a 25-cent coin for scale. Credit: University of Waterloo

Here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,

Wearable Aptalyzer Integrates Microneedle and Electrochemical Sensing for In Vivo Monitoring of Glucose and Lactate in Live Animals by Fatemeh Bakhshandeh, Hanjia Zheng, Nicole G. Barra, Sadegh Sadeghzadeh, Irfani Ausri, Payel Sen, Fatemeh Keyvani, Fasih Rahman, Joe Quadrilatero, Juewen Liu, Jonathan D. Schertzer, Leyla Soleymani, Mahla Poudineh. Advanced Materials 2313743 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/adma.202313743 First online version of record published: 16 May 2024

This paper is open access.

University of Waterloo researchers get one step closer to secure quantum communication on a global scale

A March 25, 2024 news item on phys.org announcds Canadian research into quantum communication, Note: Links have been removed,

Researchers at the University of Waterloo’s Institute for Quantum Computing (IQC) have brought together two Nobel prize-winning research concepts to advance the field of quantum communication.

Scientists can now efficiently produce nearly perfect entangled photon pairs from quantum dot sources. The research, “Oscillating photonic Bell state from a semiconductor quantum dot for quantum key distribution,” was published in Communications Physics

A March 25, 2024 University of Waterloo news release (also on EurekAlert), which originated the news item, delves further into the topic of quantum physics and communication,

Entangled photons are particles of light that remain connected, even across large distances, and the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics recognized experiments on this topic. Combining entanglement with quantum dots, a technology recognized with the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2023, the IQC research team aimed to optimize the process for creating entangled photons, which have a wide variety of applications, including secure communications.

“The combination of a high degree of entanglement and high efficiency is needed for exciting applications such as quantum key distribution or quantum repeaters, which are envisioned to extend the distance of secure quantum communication to a global scale or link remote quantum computers,” said Dr. Michael Reimer, professor at IQC and Waterloo’s Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. “Previous experiments only measured either near-perfect entanglement or high efficiency, but we’re the first to achieve both requirements with a quantum dot.”

By embedding semiconductor quantum dots into a nanowire, the researchers created a source that creates near-perfect entangled photons 65 times more efficiently than previous work. This new source, developed in collaboration with the National Research Council of Canada in Ottawa, can be excited with lasers to generate entangled pairs on command. The researchers then used high-resolution single photon detectors provided by Single Quantum in The Netherlands to boost the degree of entanglement.

“Historically, quantum dot systems were plagued with a problem called fine structure splitting, which causes an entangled state to oscillate over time. This meant that measurements taken with a slow detection system would prevent the entanglement from being measured,” said Matteo Pennacchietti, a PhD student at IQC and Waterloo’s Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. “We overcame this by combining our quantum dots with a very fast and precise detection system. We can basically take a timestamp of what the entangled state looks like at each point during the oscillations, and that’s where we have the perfect entanglement.”

To showcase future communications applications, Reimer and Pennacchietti worked with Dr. Norbert Lütkenhaus and Dr. Thomas Jennewein, both IQC faculty members and professors in Waterloo’s Department of Physics and Astronomy, and their teams. Using their new quantum dot entanglement source, the researchers simulated a secure communications method known as quantum key distribution, proving that the quantum dot source holds significant promise in the future of secure quantum communications.

Here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,

Oscillating photonic Bell state from a semiconductor quantum dot for quantum key distribution by Matteo Pennacchietti, Brady Cunard, Shlok Nahar, Mohd Zeeshan, Sayan Gangopadhyay, Philip J. Poole, Dan Dalacu, Andreas Fognini, Klaus D. Jöns, Val Zwiller, Thomas Jennewein, Norbert Lütkenhaus & Michael E. Reimer. Communications Physics volume 7, Article number: 62 (2024)
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s42005-024-01547-3 Published: 24 February 2024

This paper is open access.

Apply for 2024 summer school at Canada’s Waterloo Institute for Sustainable Nanotechnology (deadline: April 28, 2024)

This call is for Canadian undergraduate students in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics), from the University of Waterloo’s 2024 WIN Summer School on Sustainable Nanotechnology webpage,

WIN is pleased to host a Summer School on Sustainable Nanotechnology at UWaterloo on June 19 – 21, 2024.

This Summer School is open to Undergraduate Students in STEM across Canada .

The WIN Summer School will offer lab and facilities tours in the QNC, and in-class lectures by WIN members, senior PhD students and post-doctoral fellows.

Open to undergraduate students across Canada in STEM!

Topic areas:

* Smart & Functional Materials
* Connected Devices
* Next Generation Energy Systems
* Therapeutics & Theranostics

The WIN Summer School curriculum will be aligned with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

To learn more about last year’s summer school: https://uwaterloo.ca/institute-nanotechnology/news/wins-inaugural-summer-school-attracted-outstanding-students

Summer School Details

DatesJune 19 – 21, 2024
Application Due DateApril 28, 2024
LocationMike & Ophelia Lazaridis Quantum-Nano Centre (QNC) University of Waterloo
200 University Avenue West,
Waterloo, ON N2L 3G1
Notification of AcceptanceApril 2024
Application requirementsCanadian Ungeraduate Student in STEM Completed their first year of undergraduate studies
Application DetailsPlease fill out the Application form and include:  CV 1-page Research Statement Broad research interest in nanoscience and nanotechnology Alignment of your research interest with UN Sustainable Development Goals Your career goals to accomplish your research interests
Other DetailsSuccessful candidates will be provided: On-campus housing free of cost All meals  An honorarium of $500 to cover full/partial travel costs

Apply Now!

Check out the University of Waterloo’s 2024 WIN Summer School on Sustainable Nanotechnology webpage for a detailed daily agenda and more.

Finally, good luck!

Mending a broken heart with hydrogels and cellulose nanocrystals (CNC)

Courtesy: University of Waterloo

This February 12, 2024 news item on ScienceDaily highlights work from the University of Waterloo,

You can mend a broken heart this valentine’s day now that researchers invented a new hydrogel that can be used to heal damaged heart tissue and improve cancer treatments.

University of Waterloo chemical engineering researcher Dr. Elisabeth Prince teamed up with researchers from the University of Toronto and Duke University to design the synthetic material made using cellulose nanocrystals [CNC], which are derived from wood pulp.

A February 12, 2024 University of Waterloo news release (also on EurekAlert), which originated the news item, fills in some details,

The material is engineered to replicate the fibrous nanostructures and properties of human tissues, thereby recreating its unique biomechanical properties.

“Cancer is a diverse disease and two patients with the same type of cancer will often respond to the same treatment in very different ways,” Prince said. “Tumour organoids are essentially a miniaturized version of an individual patient’s tumour that can be used for drug testing, which could allow researchers to develop personalized therapies for a specific patient.”

As director of the Prince Polymer Materials Lab, Prince designs synthetic biomimetic hydrogels for biomedical applications. The hydrogels have a nanofibrous architecture with large pores for nutrient and waste transport, which affect mechanical properties and cell interaction. 

Prince, a professor in Waterloo’s Department of Chemical Engineering, utilized these human-tissue mimetic hydrogels to promote the growth of small-scale tumour replicas derived from donated tumour tissue. 

She aims to test the effectiveness of cancer treatments on the mini-tumour organoids before administering the treatment to patients, potentially allowing for personalized cancer therapies. This research was conducted alongside Professor David Cescon at the Princess Margaret Cancer Center.

Prince’s research group at Waterloo is developing similar biomimetic hydrogels to be injectable for drug delivery and regenerative medical applications as Waterloo researchers continue to lead health innovation in Canada.

Her research aims to use injected filamentous hydrogel material to regrow heart tissue damaged after a heart attack. She used nanofibers as a scaffolding for the regrowth and healing of damaged heart tissue. 

“We are building on the work that I started during my PhD to design human-tissue mimetic hydrogels that can be injected into the human body to deliver therapeutics and repair the damage caused to the heart when a patient suffers a heart attack,” Prince said.

Prince’s research is unique as most gels currently used in tissue engineering or 3D cell culture don’t possess this nanofibrous architecture. Prince’s group uses nanoparticles and polymers as building blocks for materials and develops chemistry for nanostructures that accurately mimic human tissues.

The next step in Prince’s research is to use conductive nanoparticles to make electrically conductive nanofibrous gels that can be used to heal heart and skeletal muscle tissue.

Here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,

Nanocolloidal hydrogel mimics the structure and nonlinear mechanical properties of biological fibrous networks by Elisabeth Prince, Sofia Morozova, Zhengkun Chen, and Eugenia Kumacheva. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) December 13, 2023 120 (51) e2220755120 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2220755120

This paper is behind a paywall.

Smart fabric from University of Waterloo (Canada) responds to temperature and electricity

This textile from the University of Waterloo is intriguing,

Caption: An electric current is applied to an engineered smart fabric consisting of plastic and steel fibres. Credit: University of Waterloo

An April 24, 2023 news item on phys.org introduces this new material,

A new smart material developed by researchers at the University of Waterloo is activated by both heat and electricity, making it the first ever to respond to two different stimuli.

The unique design paves the way for a wide variety of potential applications, including clothing that warms up while you walk from the car to the office in winter and vehicle bumpers that return to their original shape after a collision.

An April 24, 2023 University of Waterloo news release (also on EurekAlert), which originated the news item, provides more detail, Note: A link has been removed,

Inexpensively made with polymer nano-composite fibres from recycled plastic, the programmable fabric can change its colour and shape when stimuli are applied.

“As a wearable material alone, it has almost infinite potential in AI, robotics and virtual reality games and experiences,” said Dr. Milad Kamkar, a chemical engineering professor at Waterloo. “Imagine feeling warmth or a physical trigger eliciting a more in-depth adventure in the virtual world.”

The novel fabric design is a product of the happy union of soft and hard materials, featuring a combination of highly engineered polymer composites and stainless steel in a woven structure. 

Researchers created a device similar to a traditional loom to weave the smart fabric. The resulting process is extremely versatile, enabling design freedom and macro-scale control of the fabric’s properties.

The fabric can also be activated by a lower voltage of electricity than previous systems, making it more energy-efficient and cost-effective. In addition, lower voltage allows integration into smaller, more portable devices, making it suitable for use in biomedical devices and environment sensors.

“The idea of these intelligent materials was first bred and born from biomimicry science,” said Kamkar, director of the Multi-scale Materials Design (MMD) Centre at Waterloo.

“Through the ability to sense and react to environmental stimuli such as temperature, this is proof of concept that our new material can interact with the environment to monitor ecosystems without damaging them.”

The next step for researchers is to improve the fabric’s shape-memory performance for applications in the field of robotics. The aim is to construct a robot that can effectively carry and transfer weight to complete tasks.

Here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,

Multi-Stimuli Dually-Responsive Intelligent Woven Structures with Local Programmability for Biomimetic Applications by Runxin Xu, Guanzheng Wu, Mengmeng Jiang, Shaojie Cao, Mahyar Panahi-Sarmad, Milad Kamkar, Xueliang Xiao. Nano-Micro Small DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/smll.202207900 First published: 19 February 2023

This paper is open access.