Traditional fabrication methods used to manufacture biosensors for physiological, therapeutics, or health monitoring purposes are complex and rely on costly materials, which has hindered their adoption as single-use medical devices. The development of a new kind of wearable and implantable electronics relying on inexpensive materials for their manufacturing will pave the way towards the ubiquitous adoption of sticker-like health tracking devices.

One of growing and most promising applications for biosensors is the continuous health monitoring using mechanically soft, stretchable sensors. While these healthcare devices showed an excellent compatibility with human tissues, they still need highly trained personnel to perform multi-step, prolonged fabrication for several functioning layers of the device. In this dissertation, I propose low-cost, scalable, simple, and rapid manufacturing techniques to fabricate multifunctional epidermal and implantable sensors to monitor a range of biosignals including heart, muscle, or eye activity to characterizing of biofluids such as sweat. I have also used these devices as an implant to provide heat therapy for muscle regeneration and optical stimulation of neurons using optogenetics. These devices have also combined with those of triboelectric nanogenerators to realize self-powered sensors for monitoring imperceptible mechanical biosignals such as respiratory and pulse rate. 

Food health and safety has also emerged as another important frontier to develop biosensors and improve the human health and quality of life. The recent progresses on detecting microbial activity inside foods or their packages rely on development of highly functional materials. The existing materials for fabrication of food sensors, however, are often costly and toxic for human health or the environment. In this dissertation, I proposed using protein/PCL microfibers to reinforce the device in humid conditions and exploit their excellent hygroscopic properties to sense biogenic gases, as an indicator for early detection of food spoilage. Finally, my battery-free food sensors are capable of monitoring food safety with no need for extra measurement devices. Collectively, this dissertation proposes cost-effective solutions to solve human health issues, enabled by developing low-cost, functional materials and exploiting simple fabrication techniques.