Autonomous Motility of Polymer Films
Abstract
Adaptive soft materials exhibit a diverse set of behaviors including reconfiguration, actuation, and locomotion. These responses however, are typically optimized in isolation. Here, the interrelation between these behaviors is established through a state space framework, using Nylon 6 thin films in a humidity gradient as an experimental testbed. It is determined that the dynamic behaviors are a result of not only a response to but also an interaction with the applied stimulus, which can be tuned via control of the environment and film characteristics, including size, permeability, and coefficient of hygroscopic expansion to target a desired behavior such as multimodal locomotion. Using these insights, it is demonstrated that films simultaneously harvest energy and information from the environment to autonomously move down a stimulus gradient. Improved understanding of the coupling between an adaptive material and its environment aids the development of materials that integrate closed loop autonomous sensing, actuation, and locomotion.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Pub Defense Publication
- Publication Date
- Dec 22, 2017
- Source ID
- 10.1002/adma.201705616
Entities
People
- Benjamin E. Treml
- David H Wang
- Loon‐seng Tan
- Michael Kühn
- Philip R. Buskohl
- Richard A. Vaia
- Ruel N. Mckenzie
Organizations
- Air Force Office of Scientific Research
- Air Force Research Laboratory