Rapid and Reversible Tuningof Structural Color ofa Hydrogel over the Entire Visible Spectrum by Mechanical Stimulation.

In this work, we report a rubberlike elastic hydrogelcontainingmicrodomains of bilayers periodically stacked into the polymer networkthat satisfy the Bragg’s law of diffraction. The rubberlikeelastic hydrogel has been synthesized by applying double network principleinto a viscoelastic hydrogel containing single-domain macroscopiclamellar bilayer. The hydrogel is able to tune the magnificent structuralcolor reversibly over the entire wavelength range of visible spectrumas fast as the uniaxial tensile stretching and compressive deformationare applied and released. Owing to the strength, softness, and rubberlikeelastic deformability, the tunable hydrogel can be used extensivelyto design a new class of soft tactile sensor as an advanced stresssensor that is able to detect a local deformation of a complicatedforce field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]