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Download fileLight-Stimulated Permanent Shape Reconfiguration in Cross-Linked Polymer Microparticles
journal contribution
posted on 2017-04-07, 00:00 authored by Lewis Michael Cox, Xiaohao Sun, Chen Wang, Nancy Sowan, Jason P. Killgore, Rong Long, Heng-An Wu, Christopher N. Bowman, Yifu DingReconfiguring
the permanent shape of elastomeric microparticles has been impossible
due to the incapability of plastic deformation in these materials.
To address this limitation, we synthesize the first instance of microparticles
comprising a covalent adaptable network (CAN). CANs are cross-linked
polymer networks capable of reconfiguring their network topology,
enabling stress relaxation and shape changing behaviors, and reversible
addition–fragmentation chain transfer (RAFT) is the corresponding
dynamic chemistry used in this work to enable CAN-based microparticles.
Using nanoimprint lithography to apply controllable deformations we
demonstrate that upon light stimulation microparticles are able to
reconfigure their shape to permanently fix large aspect ratios and
nanoscale surface topographies.