Robust and Multi-Functional Electrically Responsive Gold/Polydopamine-Coated Liquid Crystalline Elastomer Artificial Muscles
Joshua C. Ince, Setareh Elyasi, Alan R. Duffy, Nisa V. Salim
TL;DR
This paper introduces a method to improve the performance of artificial muscles by enhancing the adhesion of electrically conductive coatings on liquid crystalline elastomers.
Contribution
A new method using polydopamine treatment to enhance adhesion of gold coatings on LCEs, enabling multi-functional electrically responsive artificial muscles.
Findings
PDA treatment significantly improves adhesion of gold coatings on LCEs.
The method enables fabrication of LCEs with strain-sensing and electro-responsive features.
The resulting materials exhibit self-actuation-sensing and joule-heating capabilities.
Abstract
Applying thin electrically conductive coatings to Liquid Crystalline Elastomers (LCEs) is an effective way of functionalizing two-way shape memory polymers with the ability to respond to electrical currents. However, achieving robust adhesion between a given electrically conductive coating and the surface of LCEs can be challenging. This can limit the functionality, performance, and potential applications of these materials. This work describes a facile method to develop electrically responsive Liquid Crystalline Elastomer polymeric artificial muscles with strain-sensing, self-actuation-sensing, and joule-heating features. In this work, the effect of treating LCEs with polydopamine (PDA) prior to functionalizing the LCE with an electrically conductive gold-sputtered coating was explored. The findings confirmed that the PDA treatment considerably improved the adhesion of the gold sputter…
Genes, proteins, chemicals, diseases, species, mutations and cell lines named across the full text — each resolved to its canonical identifier and authoritative record.
Click any figure to enlarge with its caption.
Figure 1
Figure 2
Figure 3
Figure 4
Figure 5
Figure 6
Figure 7
Figure 8
Figure 9Peer Reviews
No public reviews on file for this paper yet. If you reviewed it on a platform where reviews are public (OpenReview, ICLR, NeurIPS, ICML), you can paste yours below so the community can read it here.
Videos
No videos yet. Explain this paper in a talk, walkthrough, or lecture? Add one.
Taxonomy
TopicsAdvanced Materials and Mechanics · Polymer composites and self-healing · Dielectric materials and actuators