1. Superstretchable, yet stiff, fatigue-resistant ligament-like elastomers.
- Author
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Li M, Chen L, Li Y, Dai X, Jin Z, Zhang Y, Feng W, Yan LT, Cao Y, and Wang C
- Subjects
- Chemical Phenomena, Elastic Modulus, Elastomers, Ligaments
- Abstract
Ligaments are flexible and stiff tissues around joints to support body movements, showing superior toughness and fatigue-resistance. Such a combination of mechanical properties is rarely seen in synthetic elastomers because stretchability, stiffness, toughness, and fatigue resistance are seemingly incompatible in materials design. Here we resolve this long-standing mismatch through a hierarchical crosslinking design. The obtained elastomer can endure 30,000% stretch and exhibit a Young's modulus of 18 MPa and toughness of 228 MJ m
-3 , outperforming all the reported synthetic elastomers. Furthermore, the fatigue threshold is as high as 2,682 J m-2 , the same order of magnitude as the ligaments (~1,000 J m-2 ). We reveal that the dynamic double-crosslinking network composed of Li+ -O interactions and PMMA nanoaggregates allows for a hierarchical energy dissipation, enabling the elastomers as artificial ligaments in soft robotics., (© 2022. The Author(s).)- Published
- 2022
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