Plasma Sources and Applications Centre, NIE, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, 637616, Singapore.
School of Chemistry, Physics and Mechanical Engineering, Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, QLD, 4000, Australia.
Adv Mater. 2018 Jan;30(2). doi: 10.1002/adma.201702226. Epub 2017 Nov 20.
Increasingly intricate in their composition and structural organization, hierarchical multicomponent metamaterials with nonlinear spatially reconfigurable functionalities challenge the intrinsic constraints of natural materials, revealing tremendous potential for the advancement of biochemistry, nanophotonics, and medicine. Recent breakthroughs in high-resolution nanofabrication utilizing ultranarrow, precisely controlled ion or laser beams have enabled assembly of architectures of unprecedented structural and functional complexity, yet costly, time- and energy-consuming high-resolution sequential techniques do not operate effectively at industry-required scale. Inspired by the fictional Baron Munchausen's fruitless attempt to pull himself up, it is demonstrated that metamaterials can undergo intrinsically driven self-assembly, metaphorically pulling themselves up into existence. These internal drivers hold a key to unlocking the potential of metamaterials and mapping a new direction for the large-area, cost-efficient self-organized fabrication of practical devices. A systematic exploration of these efforts is presently missing, and the driving forces governing the intrinsically driven self-assembly are yet to be fully understood. Here, recent progress in the self-organized formation and self-propelled growth of complex hierarchical multicomponent metamaterials is reviewed, with emphasis on key principles, salient features, and potential limitations of this family of approaches. Special stress is placed on self-assembly driven by plasma, current in liquid, ultrasonic, and similar highly energetic effects, which enable self-directed formation of metamaterials with unique properties and structures.
具有非线性空间可重构功能的多层次多组分超材料在组成和结构组织上越来越复杂，挑战了天然材料的固有限制，为生物化学、纳米光子学和医学的发展带来了巨大的潜力。利用超窄、精确控制的离子或激光束进行高分辨率纳米制造的最新突破，使得以前所未有的结构和功能复杂性的架构组装成为可能，但昂贵、耗时且能源密集型的高分辨率顺序技术在工业所需的规模上无法有效运行。受虚构的男爵芒乔森徒劳地试图将自己拉起来的启发，人们证明超材料可以进行内在驱动的自组装，隐喻地将自己拉起来存在。这些内部驱动力是解锁超材料潜力并为实用设备的大面积、低成本自组织制造开辟新方向的关键。目前缺少对这些努力的系统探索，并且尚未完全理解内在驱动自组装的驱动力。在这里，回顾了复杂多层次多组分超材料的自组织形成和自推进生长的最新进展，重点介绍了这一系列方法的关键原理、突出特点和潜在局限性。特别强调了由等离子体、电流在液体中、超声和类似的高能量效应驱动的自组装，这些自组装能够实现具有独特性能和结构的超材料的自导向形成。
