Herein we report on the synthesis of a bipedal hydrogel walker, based on N-isopropylacrylamide-co-acrylated spiropyran-co-acrylic acid p(NIPAAm-co-SP-co-AA). Due to the presence of the photochromic spiropyran molecule in the polymer structure, these hydrogels reversibly shrink and swell in aqueous environments when exposed to different light conditions. When placed onto a ratcheted surface, the actuation of the bipedal gel produces a walking motion by taking a series of steps in a given direction, as determined by the optimised design of the ratchet scaffold. We anticipate that such biomimetic hydrogel walkers could form the basis of light-actuated soft robots capable of more advanced functions such as autonomous migration to specific locations accompanied by triggered release of molecular cargo.
This item is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License. View License
Funders:
Science Foundation Ireland, Science Foundation Ireland under the Insight initiative, grant SFI/12/RC/2289, European Framework Programme 7, European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme through the NAPES project grant agreement no. 604241.
ID Code:
21787
Deposited On:
11 May 2017 09:52 by
Larisa Florea
. Last Modified 01 Feb 2023 19:58