Bio-mimic four-dimensional printing of nanostructured interactive hydrogels

TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel 4D printing technique for nanostructured hydrogels that mimic biological systems, enabling reconfigurable shapes and integrated functions at micro/nano scales.

Contribution

It presents a new 4D printing method for nanostructured hydrogels that overcomes interface issues and allows for self-adaptive, reconfigurable soft materials.

Findings

Successful fabrication of reconfigurable nanostructured hydrogels

Enhanced interface stability through hierarchical heterojunctions

Potential applications in soft robotics and biomedical devices

Abstract

Nature has exhibited numerous soft-interactive botanical or zoological systems with self-adaptivenss or reconfigurable shape, however, artificial micro/nano materials of same merit are formidable due to material/structural limitations, posing multidimensional challenges to current chemical/physical fabrications. Here, we propose a new nanostructured hydrogel by four-dimensional (4D) printing for function integration and dimension reduction. The cross-linked matrix relaxes or contracts in robust hierarchical heterojunction to eliminate interface issues of dual-layer desgin.