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Liquid‐Crystal‐Elastomer‐Actuated Reconfigurable Microscale Kirigami Metastructures
Author(s) -
Zhang Mingchao,
Shahsavan Hamed,
Guo Yubing,
PenaFrancesch Abdon,
Zhang Yingying,
Sitti Metin
Publication year - 2021
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.202008605
Subject(s) - microscale chemistry , materials science , fabrication , nanotechnology , soft robotics , microactuator , smart material , wearable computer , elastomer , actuator , computer science , artificial intelligence , embedded system , composite material , medicine , alternative medicine , mathematics , mathematics education , pathology
Programmable actuation of metastructures with predesigned geometrical configurations has recently drawn significant attention in many applications, such as smart structures, medical devices, soft robotics, prosthetics, and wearable devices. Despite remarkable progress in this field, achieving wireless miniaturized reconfigurable metastructures remains a challenge due to the difficult nature of the fabrication and actuation processes at the micrometer scale. Herein, microscale thermo‐responsive reconfigurable metasurfaces using stimuli‐responsive liquid crystal elastomers (LCEs) is fabricated as an artificial muscle for reconfiguring the 2D microscale kirigami structures. Such structures are fabricated via two‐photon polymerization with sub‐micrometer precision. Through rationally designed experiments guided by simulations, the optimal formulation of the LCE artificial muscle is explored and the relationship between shape transformation behaviors and geometrical parameters of the kirigami structures is build. As a proof of concept demonstration, the constructs for temperature‐dependent switching and information encryption is applied. Such reconfigurable kirigami metastructures have significant potential for boosting the fundamental small‐scale metastructure research and the design and fabrication of wireless functional devices, wearables, and soft robots at the microscale as well.