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Bioinspired Structural Composite Hydrogels with a Combination of High Strength, Stiffness, and Toughness
Author(s) -
Ji Donghwan,
Nguyen Thanh Loc,
Kim Jaeyun
Publication year - 2021
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.202101095
Subject(s) - materials science , self healing hydrogels , composite material , toughness , composite number , ultimate tensile strength , polymer , shrinkage , stiffness , elastic modulus , polymer chemistry
In the development of artificial hydrogels, emulating the mechanical properties of biological tissues with a desirable combination of stiffness and toughness is crucial. To achieve such properties, a design principle inspired by a natural structural composite to wet hydrogels is applied. The bioinspired structural composite hydrogel consisting of layered microplatelets and polymer matrix with strong polymer–platelet interactions is fabricated by a facile method, that is, drying‐induced unidirectional shrinkage and rehydration process coupled with secondary ionic crosslinking. The resulting hydrogels exhibit a combination of high tensile strength and elastic modulus (on the order of several MPa) and high fracture energy (up to ≈ 2 kJ·m −2 ). The results suggest the potential of the bioinspired approach that is limitedly applied in dry composites for developing mechanically robust composite hydrogels.