Beijing time, April 6th, according to foreign media reports, scientists have long known that eumelanin-the pigment that gives human skin, hair and eye color-can conduct electricity. However, the natural form of true melanin does not have sufficient conductivity, and no one knows how to mention its conductivity.
A new study recently changed this situation. In a paper published in the journal Frontiers in Chemistry, an interdisciplinary research team in Italy described a breakthrough process that can significantly increase the conductivity of true melanin.
Alessandro Pezzella, the study author and organic chemist at the University of Frederick II of Naples, said: "This is a stepping stone and a long process will begin."
Humans and other organisms do not respond to true melanin, which means it can be used to coat medical implants or other devices that may enter the body. However, the natural form of true melanin is too regular at the molecular level and the conductivity is not high. In previous studies, without the addition of metals or other chemicals, the electrical conductivity of true melanin could not be improved, but these substances will be treated as foreign by the body. In order to increase the electrical conductivity of true melanin without adding external factors, Pezzera and his colleagues developed a process of organizing molecules that allows charge to flow from one electron to another.
Co-author Paolo Tassini, an electrical engineer at the Italian National Agency for New Technology, Energy and Sustainable Economic Development, said that the process was "basically heated in a vacuum." "In this way, you can completely remove oxygen and water vapor." Without additional molecules, true melanin can conduct electricity better.
Tasini said that this process turned true melanin into a "real conductor", whose conductivity has increased by more than 9 orders of magnitude. The researchers called the results they obtained "High Vacuum Annealed Eumelanin" (HVAE).
However, true melanin is still a pigment. Pezzera said that metals have completely different conductivity ranges, and HAVE's conductivity is much weaker. However, this is the first time that true melanin can be used in the field of bioelectronics.
Phillip Messersmith, a materials scientist at the University of California, Berkeley, said: "I think this work is very important." He was not involved in the study. However, he also pointed out that researchers still have to face many unresolved problems and challenges. A big problem is that when exposed to water, true melanin loses its electrical conductivity, and the conductivity of HAVE is also greatly reduced. This will challenge the application of true melanin inside the human body, because the human body is mostly composed of water. Future research may make true melanin more adaptable. "I don't think this is an insurmountable challenge," Mercer Smith said.
Pezzera said that their next step is to create a "very simple structure", made of HAVE, "like a film". In the future, this film may be coated on electronic devices used in the human body, but it still has a long way to go.
When the researchers tried to heat melanin in a vacuum, they did not know what would happen. The high temperature of about 540 degrees Celsius does not simply burn these pigments. On the contrary, it makes the density of true melanin higher, just like an aluminum foil ball is pressed more and more closely. "We are very happy with everything we found," Tahini said.
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