Institute of Hybrid Materials, College of Materials Science and Engineering, Qingdao University, Qingdao, 266071, PR China.
Nanoscale. 2019 Jan 31;11(5):2231-2237. doi: 10.1039/c8nr07863g.
Electro-responsive hydrogel actuators have gained much attention because of their fast response, low power consumption and easy modulation. However, such hydrogel actuators suffer from poor mechanical properties and restricted bending direction, which limit their practical applications. Herein, we report a nanocomposite hydrogel actuator with a combination of high mechanical tensile strength (2 MPa) and automatic bidirectional bending behavior in response to electric signals. The resulting hydrogel, crosslinked by aluminum hydroxide nanoparticles, shows rapid bending behavior and could be cyclically actuated up to ten times in an electric field. Furthermore, the hydrogel demonstrates bidirectional bending actuation, which was ascribed to the difference in diffusion coefficients and concentrations of cations and anions within the gel network. Moreover, the direction and magnitude of the bending behavior could be tuned by composition variation. The hydrogel actuators developed in this study may have great potential in soft robotics, artificial muscles and tissue engineering.
电响应水凝胶驱动器因其响应速度快、功耗低和易于调节而受到广泛关注。然而，这种水凝胶驱动器存在机械性能差和弯曲方向受限的问题，限制了它们的实际应用。在此，我们报道了一种纳米复合水凝胶驱动器，它具有高机械拉伸强度（2 MPa）和自动双向弯曲行为，可以响应电信号。由纳米氢氧化铝交联的水凝胶表现出快速弯曲行为，并在电场中可循环驱动多达十次。此外，该水凝胶表现出双向弯曲驱动行为，这归因于凝胶网络中阳离子和阴离子的扩散系数和浓度的差异。此外，弯曲行为的方向和幅度可以通过组成变化来调节。本研究开发的水凝胶驱动器在软机器人、人工肌肉和组织工程等领域具有很大的应用潜力。
