Flexible Zinc-Ion Battery-Powered Wearable Devices for Vital Sign Monitoring

Abstract

Wearable devices play a crucial role in real-time health monitoring by continuously tracking important physiological indicators such as heart rate, blood oxygen saturation, and body temperature. This not only helps achieve personalized health management but also enables early disease warning. However, traditional rigid power sources (such as lithium-ion batteries) are difficult to adapt to the dynamic deformations of wearable devices in use, such as bending and stretching, and also pose certain safety risks. Therefore, developing flexible energy storage systems that combine high safety, good mechanical flexibility, and high energy density has become an important research direction. Flexible zinc-ion batteries are regarded as a promising solution due to their use of non-flammable aqueous electrolytes, abundant resources, low cost, and good mechanical adaptability. This article systematically reviews the latest progress of flexible zinc-ion batteries, covering key components (electrodes, electrolytes, packaging), device structure design, integration solutions with wearable sensors, and their applications in scenarios such as electrocardiogram monitoring, body temperature tracking, and motion monitoring. The article also explores the current challenges that still exist in terms of energy density, cycle life, mechanical-electrochemical stability, and biocompatibility. Finally, the development directions of future practical applications were prospected, with a focus on innovative material design, structural optimization, intelligent system integration, and the promotion of related standardization.

Keywords

Flexible zinc-ion batteries / Wearable devices / Health monitoring / Flexible electronics / Energy integration / Aqueous electrolytes / Self powered system / Biocompatibility

Statement on the Use of Generative AI and AI-Assisted Technologies in the Writing Process

During the writing process of this paper, DeepSeek was utilized solely for language polishing and expression refinement. All academic viewpoints, research data, core content, and argumentative logic were independently generated by the authors or the cited papers.

Acknowledgments

The authors express their gratitude to all team members who contributed to this work. Appreciation is extended to Guangdong University of Education for providing an excellent academic research environment and support.

Author Contributions

Conceptualization: K.L., J.L. and X.G.; Investigation: J.M.; Resources: J.M.; Data Curation: K.L.; Writing-Original Draft Preparation: K.L.; Writing-Review & Editing: X.H.; Visualization: J.L.; Supervision: X.G.; Project Administration: X.G.

Ethics Statement

Not applicable.

Informed Consent Statement

Not applicable.

Data Availability Statement

This study is a review article and did not generate new experimental data. All data referenced are from the citations provided in the manuscript.

Funding

This research was funded by Research and Innovation Team for Wastewater Treatment and Monitoring of Guangdong University of Education (2024KYCXTD016), Guangdong Provincial Department of Education Key Area Special Project (2022ZDZX4037, 2024ZDZX2087, 2024ZDZX4063), and College Student Innovation and Entrepreneurship Program Training Program (S202514278032).

Declaration of Competing Interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

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