KOCHI: Implantable medical devices (IMDs), which can assist as functional devices to detect, prevent and cure many diseases in one’s body, face one significant challenge. The devices can be cause for patients to require periodical surgeries to replace the battery.
According to researchers at Cusat, lithium batteries — commonly used to power implanted medical devices — have limited capacity and lifetime. However, the team has just the solution — biocompatible piezoelectric scaffolds for bone and tissue engineering applications, which can replace the batteries in IMDs. “Such an invention can ensure effective and sustainable power supply to these devices,” said the team.
The plan is to focus on the development of biocompatible pliable piezoelectric nano-fibres that can be used for the fabrication of nano-generators for implantable applications. “The pliable piezoelectric polymer nano-composites with 2D nanomaterials will be used as fillers. To develop piezoelectric systems, poly-vinylidene fluoride-tri-fluoro ethylene will be used as the polymer matrix,” said the team. Different biocompatible fillers will be incorporated into the polymer matrix and the electro-spinning method will be carried out for the development of piezoelectric nanofibers, they added.