Slime isn’t just for kids’ TV shows anymore—it could be the next breakthrough straight out of sci-fi.
Researchers at the University of Guelph in Canada have developed “slime” that produces electricity when compressed, and its potential applications range from clean energy production to medical products. Think elementary school slime project, but on steroids. Their work was detailed in a February 1 study published in the Journal of Molecular Liquids.
The prototype material is made of oleic acid (a fatty acid present in olive oil), amino acids (which make up our protein) and 90% water, meaning it’s absolutely natural and not harmful to the body. Why is this important?
“Our bodies produce small electric fields to attract healing cells to an open wound,” Erica Pensini, an environmental engineer at the University of Guelph and co-author on the study, said in a Canadian Light Source research institute statement. “By creating a bandage that increases this electric field, healing could theoretically happen faster. In this case, the bandage would be activated by our natural movements and breathing.”
That’s why she “wanted to make something that is 100 per cent benign and that I would put on my skin without any concerns,” she explained. The team’s slime-like material could also theoretically be used in synthetic skin to help train future robots to check a patient’s pulse, she explained, or in shoe insoles to better analyze people’s manner of walking.
While the material can produce energy, the researchers also discovered that they can change its crystalline structure by applying an electric field. Using a synchrotron—”like a super-microscope,” according to Pensini—the researchers observed the slime forming microscopic structures, including layered, sponge-like, and hexagonal patterns. Watching this happen must’ve been fun, but the discovery could also have major implications for targeted drug delivery.
This was undoubtedly a fun thing to observe, but this could also have important applications involving the targeted delivery of medicine.
“Imagine you have the material take an initial structure that contains a pharmaceutical substance and then, when an electric field is applied to it, the structure changes to release the medicine,” she said.
The seemingly magic slime could be used in contexts beyond the medical world. Because it can generate electricity, it could be put into floors to generate electricity from the pressure of people walking on it (Coldplay’s Music of the Spheres World Tour kinetic dancefloors, anyone?).
While more research is needed before this “slime” can enter the market, Pensini is already testing it on herself by using it as a balm for her hands after rock climbing: “I need an initial guinea pig, so it might as well be me, right?”
Just think—one day, you might be reaching for slime instead of bandages at your local pharmacy.
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English (US) ·