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Water‐Rich Biomimetic Composites with Abiotic Self‐Organizing Nanofiber Network
Author(s) -
Xu Lizhi,
Zhao Xueli,
Xu Chuanlai,
Kotov Nicholas A.
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
advanced materials
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 10.707
H-Index - 527
eISSN - 1521-4095
pISSN - 0935-9648
DOI - 10.1002/adma.201703343
Subject(s) - materials science , nanofiber , composite material , ultimate tensile strength , toughness , vinyl alcohol , aramid , self healing hydrogels , composite number , stiffness , polymer , fracture toughness , compressive strength , fiber , polymer chemistry
Load‐bearing soft tissues, e.g., cartilage, ligaments, and blood vessels, are made predominantly from water (65–90%) which is essential for nutrient transport to cells. Yet, they display amazing stiffness, toughness, strength, and deformability attributed to the reconfigurable 3D network from stiff collagen nanofibers and flexible proteoglycans. Existing hydrogels and composites partially achieve some of the mechanical properties of natural soft tissues, but at the expense of water content. Concurrently, water‐rich biomedical polymers are elastic but weak. Here, biomimetic composites from aramid nanofibers interlaced with poly(vinyl alcohol), with water contents of as high as 70–92%, are reported. With tensile moduli of ≈9.1 MPa, ultimate tensile strains of ≈325%, compressive strengths of ≈26 MPa, and fracture toughness of as high as ≈9200 J m −2 , their mechanical properties match or exceed those of prototype tissues, e.g., cartilage. Furthermore, with reconfigurable, noncovalent interactions at nanomaterial interfaces, the composite nanofiber network can adapt itself under stress, enabling abiotic soft tissue with multiscale self‐organization for effective load bearing and energy dissipation.