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Giving Direction to Motion and Surface with Ultra‐Fast Speed Using Oriented Hydrogel Fibers
Author(s) -
Liu Li,
Jiang Shaohua,
Sun Yue,
Agarwal Seema
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
advanced functional materials
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 6.069
H-Index - 322
eISSN - 1616-3028
pISSN - 1616-301X
DOI - 10.1002/adfm.201503612
Subject(s) - materials science , membrane , bending , actuator , electrospinning , composite material , deformation (meteorology) , porosity , orientation (vector space) , nanotechnology , polymer , computer science , geometry , genetics , mathematics , artificial intelligence , biology
Thermoresponsive hydrogel fibrous membranes showing directionally controlled movements and surface change with ultra‐fast speed are presented for the first time. They show reversible coiling, rolling, bending, and twisting deformations in different controllable directions for many cycles (at least 50 cycles tried) with inside‐out change in surfaces and shapes. Speed, reversibility, large‐scale deformations and, most importantly, control over the direction of deformation is required in order to make synthetic actuators inspired from natural materials or otherwise. A polymeric synthetic material combining all these properties is still awaited. This issue is addressed and provide a very simple system fulfilling all these requirements by combining porosity and asymmetric swelling/shrinking via orientation of hydrogel fibers at different angles in a fibrous membrane. Electrospinning is used as a tool for making membranes with fibers oriented at different angles.