Control of active polymeric filaments by chemically-powered nanomotors

TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel active polymeric filament system activated by embedded chemically-powered nanomotors, enabling control over filament conformations through chemical reactions and oscillatory chemical constraints.

Contribution

It presents a new class of active filament systems with embedded nanomotors that can be controlled chemically to alter filament structure and dynamics.

Findings

Nanomotor-activated filaments can be expanded or compressed by changing chemical conditions.

Oscillatory chemical constraints induce gel-like networks to oscillate between states.

Embedded nanomotors serve as both activity source and control mechanism.

Abstract

Active materials with distinctive nonequilibrium properties have diverse materials science applications. Active systems are common in living matter, such as the filament network in the cell that is activated by molecular motors, and in materials science as exemplified by hydrogels activated by chemical reactions. Here we describe another class of active polymeric filament systems where the filaments are activated by embedded chemically-powered nanomotors that have catalytic and noncatalytic parts. Chemical reactions on the catalytic surfaces produce forces that act on the polymeric filaments. By changing the nonequilibrium conditions these forces can be made to change sign and thereby compress or expand the filaments. The embedded motors provide both the source of activity and the means to control the filament conformational structure. As an example of control, we show that oscillatory variations of the chemical constraints yield gel-like networks that oscillate between expanded or compressed forms, much like those of hydrogels.