Recent advances in soft materials and mechanics activate development of many new types of electrical medical implants. Electronic implants that provide exceptional functions, however, usually require more electrical power, resulting in shorter period of usages although many approaches have been suggested to harvest electrical power in human bodies by resolving the issues related to power density, biocompatibility, tissue damage, and others. Here, we report an active photonic power transfer approach at the level of a full system to secure sustainable electrical power in human bodies. The active photonic power transfer system consists of a pair of the skin-attachable photon source patch and the photovoltaic device array integrated in a flexible medical implant. The skin-attachable patch actively emits photons that can penetrate through live tissues to be captured by the photovoltaic devices in a medical implant. The wireless power transfer system is very simple, e.g., active power transfer in direct current (DC) to DC without extra circuits, and can be used for implantable medical electronics regardless of weather, covering by clothes, in indoor or outdoor at day and night. We demonstrate feasibility of the approach by presenting thermal and mechanical compatibility with soft live tissues while generating enough electrical power in live bodies through in vivo animal experiments. We expect that the results enable long-term use of currently available implants in addition to accelerating emerging types of electrical implants that require higher power to provide diverse convenient diagnostic and therapeutic functions in human bodies.

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Mechanical flexibility introduced in functional electronic devices has allowed electronics to avoid mechanical breakage, conform to nonplanar surfaces, or attach to deformable surfaces, leading to greatly expanded applications, and some research efforts have already led to commercialization. However, most of these devices are passively bendable by external driving forces. Actively bendable flexible thin film devices can be applied to new fields with new functionalities. Here, we report robotic flexible electronics with actively self-bendable flexible films that can serve as a platform for flexible electronics and other applications with the capability of reversible bending and unbending by electrical control. Experimental studies along with mechanical modeling enable the predictable and reversible transformation into different structures by adjusting the design parameters. Demonstrations for self-bendable flexible displays and soft robotic hands prove the feasibility of the concept.

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Advanced design and integration of functioning devices with secured power is of interest for many applications that require complicated, sophisticated, or multifunctional processes in confined environments such as in human bodies. Here, strategies for design and realization are introduced for multifunctional feedback implants with the bifacial design and silicon (Si) photovoltaics in flexible forms. The approaches provide efficient design spaces for flexible Si photovoltaics facing up for sustainable powering and multiple electronic components for feedback functions facing down for sensing, processing, and stimulating in human bodies. The computational and experimental results including in vivo assessments ensure feasibility of the approaches by demonstrating feedback multifunctions, power‐harvesting in milliwatts, and mechanical compatibility for operations in live tissues. This work should useful for wide range of applications that require sustainable power and advanced multifunctions.