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Accelerating the stimuli-responsive bending of a gel using mechanical constraints

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A Correction to this article was published on 20 October 2023

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Abstract

Gel bends in response to external stimuli, which has important technical applications ranging from artificial muscle to drug delivery. Here, we predict a simple and effective method to accelerate the bending of gel using mechanical constraints. We propose an exact theory of the bending dynamics of gel, which gives analytical solutions for the time evolution of the gel curvature and the relaxation time with which the system approaches to its final equilibrium state. The theory shows that the relaxation time of a slender gel confined between two parallel and rigid plates is smaller than it of a free gel with no constraints, indicating that gel bends faster when swollen in the direction parallel to the two confined plates by adding more mechanical constraints. The advantages of this new method is no need to change the microstructure and components of gel itself as previous methods. This finding brings valuable approach in designing soft robotics and healthcare devices, and is subject to experimental test.

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Data Availability Statement

The authors declare that all data supporting the findings of this study are available within the article and its supplementary information files.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported in part by the NSFC-ISF Research Program, jointly funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) under Grant No. 21961142020 and the Israel Science Foundation (ISF) under Grant No. 3396/19, NSFC Grants No. 21822302, the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central University under Grant No. YWF-22-K-101. We also acknowledge the support of the High-Performance Computing Center of Beihang University.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center of Soft Matter Physics and its Applications, School of Physics, Beihang University, Beijing, 100191, China

    Peihan Lyu, Zhaoyu Ding & Xingkun Man

  2. Peng Huanwu Collaborative Center for Research and Education, Beihang University, Beijing, 100191, China

    Xingkun Man

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  1. Peihan Lyu
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  2. Zhaoyu Ding
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All authors contributed equally to the paper.

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Correspondence to Xingkun Man.

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I learned lots of legends about Fyl before I met him in his office in UCSB, 2012. I am glad to have this article to dedicate to Fyl Pincus who made a great impact on Physics and also on myself.

The original online version of this article was revised: A dedication to the collection: Festschrift in honor of Philip (Fyl) Pincus has been added.

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Lyu, P., Ding, Z. & Man, X. Accelerating the stimuli-responsive bending of a gel using mechanical constraints. Eur. Phys. J. E 46, 40 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1140/epje/s10189-023-00303-9

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