Developing sustainable bioreactors using magnetically actuated smart materials

Conventional bioreactors are often constrained in efficiency and sustainability due to the difficulty of regulating microbial cell behavior. Recent advances in nanomaterials engineering and biotechnology have revealed that magnetically actuated materials (MAMs) can generate spatially controllable magneto-mechanical forces under low-frequency magnetic fields (LFMF), enabling regulation of specific cellular behaviors or mechanical disruption of cell structures. This strategy has shown promise in environmental and biomedical applications. Integrating LFMF with MAMs could significantly improve bioreactor efficiency and sustainability, aligning with global demands for carbon reduction and environmental protection. However, this approach spans materials science, medicine, and microbiology, and its application in bioreactors remains theoretically underdeveloped, with current research still at a preliminary stage. In this review, we systematically summarize the properties, synthesis strategies, and functional designs of MAMs relevant to sustainable bioreactors, analyze different types of LFMF, and propose feasible integration schemes. Finally, the scientific limitations of LFMF + MAMs systems for autonomous, sustainable bioreactors are critically discussed, and future research directions are outlined.