Printed hydrogel nanocomposites: fine-tuning nanostructure for anisotropic mechanical and conductive properties
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ORIGINAL RESEARCH
Printed hydrogel nanocomposites: fine-tuning nanostructure for anisotropic mechanical and conductive properties Weiwei Zhao 1
&
Lijin Chen 1 & Sanming Hu 2 & Zhijun Shi 2 & Xing Gao 3 & Vadim V. Silberschmidt 4
Received: 22 April 2020 / Revised: 28 May 2020 / Accepted: 11 June 2020 # Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020
Abstract Additive manufacturing of composites offers a potential for a new level of control over a material’s structure at the microscale. The focus of this work is a 2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate (HEMA)–based gelation system with orderly distributed carbon nanotubes (CNTs). CNTs undergo shear-induced alignment during printing process, and retain their orientation after the polymerisation of HEMA monomers, thereby, forming a nanocomposite with anisotropic mechanical and electrical properties. It is characterised with an intensive programme of mechanical tests including quasistatic uniaxial stretching, and dynamic cyclic loadings, as well as its four-terminal sensing of conductive characteristics. A coupling effect of mechanical and electrical properties is also studied. The experimental findings are discussed in detail and demonstrate that the orientation of CNTs affects both the mechanical and electrical conductive properties of the nanocomposites in terms of its ultimate strength, resistivity, and a piezoresistive coefficient. Understanding of anisotropic electromechanical properties of printed PHEMA-CNT hydrogel nanocomposite will ultimately underpin the development of smart soft materials for diverse applications, such as biomimetic nucleus pulposus or flexible electronics. Keywords Printed hydrogel nanocomposite . Anisotropic electromechanical properties . Nanofibre alignment . Carbon nanotubes
1 Introduction High water-locking capacity, excellent biocompatibility and soft mechanical properties endow hydrogels with a great potential for biomedical applications, e.g. scaffolds in tissue engineering [1, 2], substrates for cell culturing [3, 4], wound healing Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s42114-020-00161-5) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * Weiwei Zhao [email protected] 1
School of Mechanical and Electronic Engineering, Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan 430070, China
2
College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074, China
3
Research Centre for Medical Robotics and Minimally Invasive Surgical Devices, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology, Shenzhen 518055, China
4
Wolfson School of Mechanical, Electrical and Manufacturing Engineering, Loughborough University, Loughborough, Leicestershire LE11 3TU, UK
[5, 6] or medical electrodes [7]. Additive manufacturing techniques also known as 3D printing enable a precise control of complex internal structures and the constructing routes by employing their benefits of computer aid design and freeform fabrication [8, 9]. Introduction of 3D
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