Abstract
Liquid-crystal elastomers (LCEs) have attracted great attention as stimuli-responsive materials due to their capability of large and reversible deformation, rendering them excellent candidates for soft actuators, artificial muscles, photonic devices, and biomedical engineering. Unlike conventional LCEs featuring permanent crosslinked networks, LCEs with covalent adaptable networks (CAN-LCEs) enable program into monodomain LCEs from polydomain LCEs due to the network rearrangement induced by bond exchange reactions. In addition, the CAN-LCEs are capable of welding, self-healing, recycling, reprocessing, or reprogramming. Herein, the latest achievements of CAN-LCEs are summarized. The CAN-LCEs based on various types of bond exchange reactions and design strategies are discussed in detail. The novel properties brought by CANs, including welding, self-healing, remolding, recycling, and reprogramming, as well as their emerging applications are also discussed. Finally, this review summarizes the challenges and potential future developments in this emerging research area.
摘要
液晶弹性体(LCEs)是一种刺激响应性材料, 具有较大且可逆变形的能力, 在软致动器、人造肌肉、光子器件和生物医学工程等领域引起了广泛的关注. 与具有永久交联网络的传统液晶弹性体不同, 具有共价自适应网络的液晶弹性体(CAN-LCEs)可以通过键交换反应引起的网络重排将多畴液晶弹性体编程为单畴液晶弹性体. 此外, CAN-LCEs 还具有焊接、自修复、回收、再加工或重新编程的能力. 本文综述了CAN-LCEs的最新研究成果, 详细讨论了基于各种类型的键交换反应的CAN-LCEs及其设计策略. 同时, 本文还介绍了共价自适应网络给LCEs带来的新功能, 包括焊接、自愈、重塑、回收、重新编程等, 并探讨了CAN-LCEs在各种领域的应用前景. 最后, 本文总结了这一新兴研究领域面临的挑战和潜在的未来发展方向.
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Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) (51973087, 52173170, and 22169012), the Thousand Talents Plan of Jiangxi Province (jxsq2019201004) and the Natural Science Foundation of Jiangxi Province (20212ACB203010).
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Zhu Y, Xu Z, Wu F, and Chen L conceived the structure of the review. Zhu Y and Xu Z participated in the analysis, drawing, and writing of the review. Wang M, Wu F, and Chen L revised the draft before submission. All authors co-edited the final version of the manuscript.
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Yangyang Zhu is currently a postgraduate student at Nanchang University under the supervision of Professor Lie Chen. In 2021, he received his Bachelor’s degree in chemistry and chemical engineering from Jiangxi Science & Technology Normal University. In 2022, he did a research visit at Southeast University. His research interest is the design and synthesis of functional liquid-crystal elastomers with covalent adaptable networks.
Meng Wang received his PhD degree in chemical engineering and technology from Southeast University in 2017. He is currently an associate researcher at the School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Southeast University, Jiangsu, China. His research interests mainly focus on stimuli-responsive materials and soft actuators.
Feiyan Wu received her PhD degree in 2014 from Nanchang University. Now, she is an associate professor of chemistry at Nanchang University. Her research interests mainly focus on the molecular designing of organic semiconductor materials and their application in organic thermoelectric and organic photovoltaics.
Lie Chen received her PhD degree from Nanchang University in 2009. In the period of 2012–2013, she worked as a postdoctoral fellow at Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research in Germany. Now, she is a full professor of chemistry at Nanchang University. Her research interest covers the design of organic semiconductor materials, organic solar cells and the flexible photovoltaic devices.
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Zhu, Y., Xu, Z., Wu, F. et al. Liquid-crystal elastomers based on covalent adaptable networks: From molecular design to applications. Sci. China Mater. 66, 3004–3021 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40843-023-2474-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40843-023-2474-8