' INTRODUCTION
Materials1À4 that can be manipulated to a "fixed" temporary shape and reverted later to the "memorized" original shape upon exposure to an external stimulus such as heat, 1À3 light, 5À7 magnetic fields, 8,9 or chemicals 10À13 are useful for a plethora of potential applications that range from mechanically adaptive materials for biomedical devices 2,14À18 to aerospace structures 18,19 to dry adhesives 20 to optical devices. 21 Polymers intrinsically show shapememory effects, on the basis of rubber elasticity, but with varied characteristics of strain recovery rate, work capability during recovery, and retracted state stability. The elasticity can be imparted by covalent or physical cross-links. The polymer is typically deformed in its rubbery state above a transition temperature (T trans ), i.e., either glass transition, crystallization, or melting temperature, is cooled to below the transition temperature (T trans ) to fix a temporary shape in which the energy used for deformation is stored. Later, the recovery to its original shape is driven by regaining the entropy lost during deformation. 22 The ability to fix temporary shapes depends mainly on the possibility to create discrete reversible phase transitions in the polymer. 23À26 Thus, a broad range of different shape-memory polymers has been or can be developed, which exploit various reversible phase transitions and are designed to respond to different external stimuli. The most widely studied behavior is a purely thermally induced shape-memory effect, which relies on heating to above and cooling to below a transition temperature; indirect heating upon exposure of appropriately modified systems to an electrical current, magnetic field, or light represent interesting variations of this approach. 27À30 A light-induced shape-memory effect was also demonstrated, which was achieved by introducing photoresponsive cinnamic acid units into acrylate hydrogels. This allows one to trigger the shape-memory effect with light under isothermal conditions. 5 Comparably few materials have been described in which the shape-memory recovery can be triggered by a chemical stimulus. One design approach for such materials relies on the reduction of the glass transition temperature (T g ) of thermoresponsive shape-memory polyurethanes by way of plasticization upon immersion in water; here, the fixation of the temporary shape involved deformation at elevated temperature and cooling below T g . 10,11,31 Recently a purely solvent-induced shape-memory effect was also reported for a chemically cross-linked polyvinyl alcohol.
12,13ABSTRACT: New biomimetic, stimuli-responsive mechanically adaptive nanocomposites, which change their mechanical properties upon exposure to water and display a water-activated shape-memory effect, were investigated. These materials were produced by introducing rigid cotton cellulose nanowhiskers (CNWs) into a rubbery polyurethane (PU) matrix. A series of materials with CNW concentrations of 2À20% v/v was produced by solution blending CNWs an...