Mechanical characterization of a bifunctional Tetronic hydrogel adhesive for soft tissues.

Although a number of tissue adhesives and sealants for surgical use are currently available, attaining a useful balance in high strength, high compliance, and low swelling has proven difficult. Recent studies have demonstrated that a four-arm poly(propylene oxide)-poly(ethylene oxide) block copolymer, Tetronic, can be chemically modified to form a hydrogel tissue adhesive (Cho et al., Acta Biomater 2012;8:2223-2232; Barrett et al.

An ultrafast nickel-iron battery from strongly coupled inorganic nanoparticle/nanocarbon hybrid materials.

Ultrafast rechargeable batteries made from low-cost and abundant electrode materials operating in safe aqueous electrolytes could be attractive for electrochemical energy storage. If both high specific power and energy are achieved, such batteries would be useful for power quality applications such as to assist propelling electric vehicles that require fast acceleration and intense braking. Here we develop a new type of Ni-Fe battery by employing novel inorganic nanoparticle/graphitic nanocarbon (carbon nanotubes and graphene) hybrid materials as electrode materials.