Bio-inspired heterointerfacial ion-gating and iontronic neuromorphics

The human nervous system communicates through efficient ion-mediated processes, motivating the development of iontronic systems that emulate its adaptive and low-power information processing. Specifically, ion-selective transport and the kinetic hysteresis of biological ion channels form the foundation of neural signaling, including selective transmission, temporal plasticity, and memory effects. Here, we introduce bio-inspired heterointerfacial ion-gating mechanisms within soft-matter iontronic frameworks to realize controllable ionic signal transmission. By engineering cascaded interfaces derived from microphase-separated heterointerfaces within a three-dimensional architecture, the system generates ion-dependent energy landscapes that couple species-level selectivity with tunable transport dynamics. Building on recent advances in microphase-separated gels and droplet-based iontronics, we identify potential key design principles and functional rules for programming multi-ionic signaling and neuromorphic responses into soft-matter iontronic systems. More importantly, we outline future opportunities where ion-gated iontronic neuromorphics could utilize different ionic species as a specific language to construct soft biointegrated sensing, adaptive neuromodulation, and energy-efficient information processing.