Multifunctional oxidized arabinogalactan/N-methylacrylamide chitosan-based elastic gel designed by dual crosslinking...

Conductive elastic gels have emerged as promising candidates for portable smart wearable electronics, flexible sensors, and triboelectric nanogenerators. However, the polysaccharide-based elastic gels usually encounter challenges in terms of mechanics and stability. In this study, we established a homogeneous reaction system and utilized the Schiff base reaction between N-methylacrylamide chitosan (N-MAC) and oxidized arabinogalactan (OAG), as well as the copolymerization reaction of N-MAC with hydroxyethyl acrylate monomer, to develop a dual network (DN) elastic gel with excellent mechanical properties (tensile strength of 2.4 MPa, elongation at break of 310%, and toughness of 2.3 MJ/m³), stability, and conductivity. Experimental results demonstrated that the elastic gel exhibited excellent sensing performance and could accurately detect various deformation modes. Notably, the material showed considerable promise in energy harvesting applications. When employed as a triboelectric layer in a triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) with an area of 2 × 2 cm², it generated an open-circuit voltage of up to 160 V, successfully lighting 26 LEDs. These findings fully validate the potential of the developed polysaccharide-based elastic gel as a high-performance material for wearable electronic devices, intelligent sensing systems, and sustainable energy conversion, providing novel solutions to meet practical application demands.