Synthesis and alignment of liquid crystalline elastomers

KM Herbert, HE Fowler, JM McCracken… - Nature Reviews …, 2022 - nature.com
Liquid crystalline elastomers (LCEs) are crosslinked polymer networks that combine the
elastic properties of rubber with the anisotropic properties of liquid crystals. Multifunctionality …

Recent advances in 4D printing of liquid crystal elastomers

M Chen, M Gao, L Bai, H Zheng, HJ Qi… - Advanced …, 2023 - Wiley Online Library
Liquid crystal elastomers (LCEs) are renowned for their large, reversible, and anisotropic
shape change in response to various external stimuli due to their lightly cross‐linked …

Active materials for functional origami

S Leanza, S Wu, X Sun, HJ Qi, RR Zhao - Advanced Materials, 2024 - Wiley Online Library
In recent decades, origami has been explored to aid in the design of engineering structures.
These structures span multiple scales and have been demonstrated to be used toward …

4D printing of reprogrammable liquid crystal elastomers with synergistic photochromism and photoactuation

M Chen, Y Hou, R An, HJ Qi, K Zhou - Advanced Materials, 2024 - Wiley Online Library
Abstract 4D printing of liquid crystal elastomers (LCEs) via direct ink writing has opened up
great opportunities to create stimuli‐responsive actuations for applications such as soft …

Multi-functional liquid crystal elastomer composites

Y Wang, J Liu, S Yang - Applied Physics Reviews, 2022 - pubs.aip.org
Liquid crystal elastomers (LCEs), owing to their intrinsic anisotropic property and capability
of generating programmable complex morphologies under heat, have been widely used for …

Advances in 4D printing of liquid crystalline elastomers: materials, techniques, and applications

Z Guan, L Wang, J Bae - Materials Horizons, 2022 - pubs.rsc.org
Liquid crystalline elastomers (LCEs) are polymer networks exhibiting anisotropic liquid
crystallinity while maintaining elastomeric properties. Owing to diverse polymeric forms and …

Bioinspired light-fueled water-walking soft robots based on liquid crystal network actuators with polymerizable miniaturized gold nanorods

X Yang, Y Chen, X Zhang, P Xue, P Lv, Y Yang… - Nano Today, 2022 - Elsevier
Walking on water is a unique locomotion mode found in aquatic living creatures. However, it
remains challenging to create light-driven aquatic soft robots that can walk freely on water …

A 3D‐Printed ferromagnetic liquid crystal elastomer with programmed dual‐anisotropy and multi‐responsiveness

Y Sun, L Wang, Z Zhu, X Li, H Sun, Y Zhao… - Advanced …, 2023 - Wiley Online Library
Liquid crystal elastomers (LCE) and magnetic soft materials are promising active materials
in many emerging fields, such as soft robotics. Despite the high demand for developing …

Application-driven carbon nanotube functional materials

Y Wu, X Zhao, Y Shang, S Chang, L Dai, A Cao - ACS nano, 2021 - ACS Publications
Carbon nanotube functional materials (CNTFMs) represent an important research field in
transforming nanoscience and nanotechnology into practical applications, with potential …

Shape morphing smart 3D actuator materials for micro soft robot

H Kim, S Ahn, DM Mackie, J Kwon, SH Kim, C Choi… - Materials Today, 2020 - Elsevier
Stimuli-responsive materials have been used in major applications such as sensors,
actuators, wearable devices, and biomedical devices owing to their ability to respond to …