A strong and tough gelatin/polyvinyl alcohol double network hydrogel actuator with superior actuation strength and fast actuation speed

Abstract

Hydrogels are widely used in actuators that are applied in numerous fields such as multifunctional sensors, soft robots, artificial muscles, manipulators and microfluidic valves, yet their applications in soft robots...

Fully Biosourced, Vulcanization-Free, and Thermal-Responsive Natural Rubber Material

“…As proof of the concept, a 0.4 g NR/KC band with an initial length of 6 cm is stretched to 40 cm by hanging a 100 g weight (Figure c and Movie S1). The weight can be easily lifted under the hot air blowing, demonstrating the thermal-responsive retraction behavior of NR/KC with a power density of 637J/kg, which is 50 times higher than that of mammalian muscle and also performs well in other studies of artificial muscles in Figure d. − Similarly, in Figures S5 and S6, the muscle-mimicking retraction function of NR/KC after adding nigrosin can also be triggered by electricity or infrared laser based on the joule heating effect or photothermal effect, respectively (Movies S2 and S3). These demonstrations show the scalability and great potential of NR/KC in thermal-responsive applications.…”

Personalized Medical Devices Connect Monitoring and Assistance: Emerging Wearable Soft Robotics

“…Because of their excellent adaptability, hydrogels are widely used in the fields of flexible wearable devices and electronic skin . Hydrogel is a kind of extremely hydrophilic three-dimensional network structure gel that rapidly swells in water and can maintain a large volume of water in this swelling state without dissolving.…”

“…Because of their excellent adaptability, hydrogels are widely used in the fields of flexible wearable devices and electronic skin. 31 Hydrogel is a kind of extremely hydrophilic three-dimensional network structure gel that rapidly swells in water and can maintain a large volume of water in this swelling state without dissolving. Due to the existence of cross-linking networks, hydrogels can swell and retain a large amount of water, and the amount of water absorption is closely related to the degree of cross-linking.…”

Designing strong, fast, high-performance hydrogel actuators

“…Under ultraviolet (UV) light or in acid solution, the metal coordination bond is broken and leads to the release of stored elastic energy. Such strategy of storing-releasing elastic potential energy has been successfully applied to other hydrogel systems to generate a high work capacity of 210 J kg −1 58 or 72 kJ m −3 , 59 respectively. Most recently, Sun and co-workers achieved an ultrahigh actuation force (730 N) by turgor design (Fig.…”