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Custom 3D Printable Silicones with Tunable Stiffness
Author(s) -
Durban Matthew M.,
Lenhardt Jeremy M.,
Wu Amanda S.,
Small Ward,
Bryson Taylor M.,
PerezPerez Lemuel,
Nguyen Du T.,
Gammon Stuart,
Smay James E.,
Duoss Eric B.,
Lewicki James P.,
Wilson Thomas S.
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
macromolecular rapid communications
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.348
H-Index - 154
eISSN - 1521-3927
pISSN - 1022-1336
DOI - 10.1002/marc.201700563
Subject(s) - silicone , materials science , inkwell , elastomer , 3d printing , rheology , soft robotics , stiffness , polydimethylsiloxane , composite material , nanotechnology , self healing hydrogels , silicone elastomers , soft materials , porosity , metamaterial , polymer science , polymer chemistry , computer science , optoelectronics , robot , artificial intelligence
Silicone elastomers have broad versatility within a variety of potential advanced materials applications, such as soft robotics, biomedical devices, and metamaterials. A series of custom 3D printable silicone inks with tunable stiffness is developed, formulated, and characterized. The silicone inks exhibit excellent rheological behavior for 3D printing, as observed from the printing of porous structures with controlled architectures. Herein, the capability to tune the stiffness of printable silicone materials via careful control over the chemistry, network formation, and crosslink density of the ink formulations in order to overcome the challenging interplay between ink development, post‐processing, material properties, and performance is demonstrated.