Wearable devices are already a common feature in many SF movies. Such devices require advanced technology such as flexible, but strong, and small, but effective, batteries and sensors. These requirements are essential to strengthen the hardness of gel electrolyte to enable the device to take a more flexible form and bear strains due to mechanical shape transformation.
Electrolytes within many batteries and sensors are usually in liquid form. Their form allow advanced electrical properties, but the issue regarding leakage promoted research in the development of gel-form electrolytes. However, gel electrolytes had its own limits due to its low mechanical strength as its shape is prone to transformation. Past attempts to improve such flaws using chemical inputs existed, but they required additional procedures and ultimately made the product vulnerable to light, UV, and heat, disabling the usage of product. 
Professor Kim Jin-kon (CE) and Hwang Hee-dong (CE, Ph.D. Candidate), along with Professor Moon Hong-chul (CE)’s research team of University of Seoul, succeeded in improving the mechanical hardness of the electrochemical device by introducing a new effective ion gel based on six-arm star-shaped block copolymer. Such result was published as the cover paper in the ACS Applied Materials and Interface, an international journal about the material and chemistry field, published by the America Chemical Society. 
Prof. Kim Jin-Kon showed his anticipation towards his research and commented that “the newly developed high-strength gel electrolyte will become the core material of the electrochemical apparatus within wearable devices.”