Wearable chemical microreactors are highly desirable for life-sustaining processes such as on-demand oxygen-generation, but their development has been hindered by the lack of materials that combine dynamic robustness, textile integrability, and ultra-efficient fluid transport. Herein, we show a wearable microreactor based on armored aramid aerogel hollow fibers. Reinforcing these fibers with heat-shrink tubing yields textile-compliant elasticity while preserving their nanoporous structure. Subsequently, infusing a low-surface-energy liquid into the mesopores of aerogel walls creates a nanoconfined lubricant layer that reduces microfluidic drag by up to 68.1% compared to solid-walled channels. Finally, a O2-generated wearable microreactor prototype (268 g) achieves high space-time yield, 100% oxygen purity, and maintaining oxygen-supply under physical stress. In vivo trials at 4998 meters altitude demonstrate rapid blood oxygen saturation recovery, effectively alleviating acute hypoxia. This work establishes a materials paradigm that overcomes the trade-off between wearability and continuous-flow microreactor in on-body chemical synthesis. Wearable chemical microreactors show applications for life-sustaining processes but their development suffers from the lack of materials with dynamic robustness, textile integrability, and ultra-efficient fluid transport. Here, the authors develop a wearable microreactor based on armored aramid aerogel hollow fibers for oxygen generation with high space-time yield and maintaining oxygen-supply under physical stress.
Li et al. (Wed,) studied this question.