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Controlled Cooperative Wetting Enabled Heterogeneous Structured 3D Morphing Transducers
Author(s) -
Sridhar Sreepathy,
Wang Cong,
Terry Jonathan G.,
Chen Xue,
Sun Ansu,
Li Zhenghong,
Lv Haibao,
Xu Ben Bin,
Li Yifan
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
advanced materials interfaces
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.671
H-Index - 65
ISSN - 2196-7350
DOI - 10.1002/admi.202001211
Subject(s) - materials science , wetting , microfluidics , control reconfiguration , self healing hydrogels , swelling , nanotechnology , acrylate , bilayer , computer science , composite material , polymer , polymer chemistry , monomer , membrane , biology , genetics , embedded system
A unique microfluidics approach for functional hydrogel patterning with multilayered heterogeneous structures is presented. Prepolymer solution droplets with differentiated sodium acrylate concentrations are dispensed/printed in a wetting‐controlled “two‐parallel plate” (TPP, like a Hele‐Shaw Cell) system. The gelation within the system enables hydrogel bilayer structures with reconfigurable 3D deformations driven by in‐plane and through‐thickness heterogeneity under stimuli‐responsive mask‐less swelling/deswelling. The cooperation between swelling mismatch of functional groups results in a higher complexity of 3D reconfiguration in responding to discrete levels of stimulation inputs. This facile patterning technology with an in‐built ionic hierarchy can be scaled up/down with advanced transducing functionalities in various fields.