The main research achievements of the research team in the past three years are mainly in the development and applications of nanostructured electrodes in biomedical engineering as well as tissue engineering and regenerative medicine:

1. Development and applications of nanostructure electrodes

In recent years, the laboratory has developed nano-micron composite structure electrodes as shown in below, which have been used in biomedical sensors and glucose biofuel cells.

(A)Biomedical Sensors

(a) Electrochemical detection

The research team has successfully used nanostructured electrodes for electrochemical biomedical detection. In the past three years, the team has published 8 interdisciplinary SCI Q1 journal papers, with a total IF of 57.29 and an average IF of 7.16. The content covers the combination of the glycoprotein of Japanese encephalitis virus coat structure and human Fc receptors, orchid virus detection, enzyme-free glucose detection, early detection of Alzheimer's disease, genetically modified soybean gene detection, and acute kidney disease detection in animals.

(b) Surface Enhanced Raman Scattering (SERS)

We have collaborated with Professor Cheng-Chung Chang from the Institute of Biomedical Engineering to develop a 3D nanostructured SERS substrate to successfully and quickly detected direct bilirubin in blood. The results have been published in Biosensors and Bioelectronics (IF =12.545) and IEEE Sensors Journal (IF=4.325). The research team further integrates signal processing, AI, and SERS platforms to develop a detection technology that can simultaneously detect the concentration of individual analyte in a multiple analytes group.

(B) Glucose biofuel cell

    Glucose is the most important source of energy for many organisms. It is naturally abundant, renewable, non-toxic and easy to produce. Glucose is an extremely useful fuel for biofuel cells (GBFC). GBFC can be divided into enzyme type and non-enzyme type batteries. Enzyme-based GBFCs have disadvantages such as potential toxicity, limited enzyme stability, and cumbersome enzyme immobilization procedures; therefore; the use of nanostructures doped with noble metals and their related composite materials as catalysts has gradually become a new enzyme-free technology development trend. We further applied the micro-nano composite electrode as the electrode of enzyme-free GBFC, and continued to develop the platinum/gold nano-alloy electrode for neutral GBFC. Platinum/gold nanoalloy electrodes can be further applied to self-powered batteries for wearable or implantable medical devices.

(2) Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine

    The applicant's research on tissue engineering and regenerative medicine in the past three years is mainly related to mitochondria. The research team has developed a centrifugal microfluidic device that can extract a large amount of high-purity mitochondria. With a centrifuge used in a general laboratory, a large amount of high-purity and pollution-free mitochondria can be extracted. The research results have been published by Lab on Chip. Small organic molecules have also been developed to detect mitochondrial DNA variation, and the results have been published in Journal of Materials Chemistry B. In addition, the research team also developed a double-effect antibacterial porous chitosan membrane embedded with photosensitizers to promote accelerated recovery of infected wounds. The research results have been published by Science and Technology of Advanced Materials.