Extracting the design principles of natural materials and biological organisms, the He lab develops bioinspired soft materials and studies how the processes of polymer network formation, such as polymer assembly and phase separations, leads to superior mechanical, transport, electrical and photothermal properties. Specifically, using classic chemical physical principles to modulate macromolecule assembly up to complex polymer networks, the fundamental limits in mechanical, diffusion and electrical properties could be broken to design extreme properties. The enabled soft materials featuring high mechanical toughness, ion/electron conduction, fast stimuli response, and ‘synthetic intelligence’ make possible the next-generation soft robots, tissue replacement/implants, wearable electronics, and flexible batteries.

• PhD/Postdoc Openings: Students with background in Chemistry, Biochemistry, Materials Science and Engineering, Chemical Engineering, Optics, and Mechanics, may send CV to ximinhe@ucla.edu

Review articles about group research:

1. Bioinspired Soft Materials: From “Bio-like” Properties to “Life-like” Functions. Accounts of Materials Research, 2025
2. Noncovalent Aggregation for Diverse Properties in Hydrogels: A Comprehensive Review. Chemical Reviews, 2025, 125, 7918–7964
3. Hydrogel-Based Soft Bioelectronics for Personalized Healthcare, Med-X, 2024, 2:20
4. Hierarchical Engineering for Biopolymer-based Hydrogels with Tailored Property and Functionality. Advanced. Materials, 2414897

Hydrogels and applications in batteries and implants:

1. Strong Tough Hydrogels via the Synergy of Freeze-casting and Salting-out. Nature 2021, 590,594–599
2. Tunable Sponge-like Hierarchically Porous Hydrogels with Simultaneously Enhanced Diffusivity and Mechanical Properties. Advanced Materials, 2021
3. Rapid Self-Assembly of Robust Ultrathin Ionogel Films for High-Performance Bioelectronics. Science Advances, 2026
4. Programmable Multicolor Room-Temperature Phosphorescence Hydrogels via the Synergy of Freeze-Soaking and Salting-Out. Advanced Materials, 2025
5. Harnessing Chain Mobility via Protonation for Tough and Isotropic Hydrogel. Advanced Materials, 2026, 0, e17407
6. Tough Hydrogel Electrolytes for Anti-freezing Zinc Ion Batteries. Advanced Materials, 2023 11. PVA hydrogels with broad-range tunable mechanical properties via Hofmeister effect. Advanced Materials, 2021
7. Bioinspired high-power-density strong contractile hydrogel by programmable elastic recoil. Science advances, 2020 Nov 18;6(47):eabd2520

Soft Robotics: Physical Intelligence based on stimuli-responsive hydrogels and LCEs

1. Advancing Physical Intelligence for Autonomous Soft Robots. Science Robotics, 2025, 10, eads1292
2. Launching by Cavitation. Science, 2025, 389, 935-939
3. Supramolecular hydrogel actuators with reprogrammable magnetic orientation by locally mediated viscoelasticity and pinning force. Science Advances, 2025, 11, eadw0500
4. Antagonistic-contracting-enabled high-power-output, wide-spectrum photo-oscillator for multifunctional actuations, Nature Materials, 2024, 1476-4660
5. Sunlight-powered Self-excited Oscillators for Sustainable Autonomous Soft Robotics. Science Robotics. 2023 Apr 19;8(77):eadf4753
6. Somatosensory Actuator Based on Stretchable Conductive Photothermally-Responsive Hydrogel, Science Robotics 2021, 4, abd5483
7. Artificial Phototropism for Omnidirectional Tracking and Harvesting of Light, Nature Nanotechnology 2019, 19030441
8. Soft Phototactic Swimmer Based on Self-sustained Hydrogel Oscillator, Science Robotics 2019, 4, eaax7112

Wearable sensors:

1. On-Scalp Printing of Personalized Electroencephalography E-Tattoos, Cell Biomaterials, 2025, 5, 100004
2. High-stability conducting polymer-based conformal electrodes for bio-/iono-electronics. Materials Today. 2022 Feb 53:84-97
3. Ultrastrong, Highly Conductive and Capacitive Hydrogel Electrode for Electron-ion Transduction, Matter 2022. 5, 1–18
4. Hierarchically structured stretchable conductive hydrogels for high-performance wearable strain sensors and supercapacitors. Matter. 2020 Oct 7;3(4):1196-210

3D printing:

1. Fast and Facile Liquid Metal Printing via Projection Lithography for Highly Stretchable Electronic Circuits, Advanced Materials, 2023, 2307632
2. Room‐temperature Annealing‐free Gold Printing via Anion‐assisted Photochemical Deposition. Advanced Materials. 2022 June:2201772
3. Visualizing morphogenesis through instability formation in 4-D printing, ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces 2019, 11, 50, 47468-47475
4. A Room-temperature High-conductivity Metal Printing Paradigm with Visible-light Projection Lithography, Advanced Functional Materials 2019, 29,1, 1807615

• Physics World: Improved hydrogel could make artificial tendons
• Science: ScienceAdviser — Meet the Twirlbot 
• Nature: Tumbleweed-Style Robot Can Roll Across the Prairie — No Wind Needed
• Nature Reviews Materials: Making Tough Hydrogels Isotropic
• Science Daily: Temporary tattoo printed directly on the scalp offers easy, hair-friendly solution for measuring brainwaves 
• C&EN: Europium complex harvests ambient energy to power minirobots 

• Postdoc, Harvard University
• PhD in Chemistry, University of Cambridge

• Moore Inventor Fellow (2024) • Med-X Young Investigator Award (2024)
• Johnson & Johnson WiSTEM2D Scholars Award (2023)
• Young Investigator Medal of the Society of Engineering Science (SES) (2021)
• 3M Non-tenured Faculty Award (2020-2022) • CIFAR Azrieli Global Scholar (2019-2021)
• International Society of Bionic Engineering (ISBE) Outstanding Youth Award (2019)
• Hellman Fellows Award (2018) • UCLA Faculty Career Development Award (2017; 2018)
• Air Force Young Investigators Research Program (YIP) Award (2016)
• NSF CAREER Award (2016)