Abstract
Micro-/nanomotors are self-propelled micro-/nanomachines, which are capable of converting the surrounding fuels into mechanical movement or force. Inspired by naturally occurring biomolecular motor proteins, scientists extensively paid great attentions to synthetic micro-/nanomotors. Especially, a number of researchers devoted their efforts onto catalytic micro-/nanomotors. In the past few decades, several advanced developments and excellent contributions have been made in catalytic micro-/nanomotors. The future of this research field can be bright, but some major existing challenges such as biocompatible materials and fuels, smart controlling, and specifically practical applications are still required to be resolved. Therefore, it is essential for us to learn the state of the art of catalytic micro-/nanomotors. In this chapter, the propulsion mechanisms, fabrication methods, controlling strategies, and potential applications of catalytic micro-/nanomotors are presented and summarized.
Highlights
Movement is crucial for all different types of lives existing in both macroscopic and micro-/nanoscopic environments
Surface tension gradient along an interface can result in an imbalanced force and further produce flow, which is well known as the “Marangoni effect.”
The precise propulsion control of micro-/nanomotors is leading to advances in practical applications, and it is quite critical to put forward the controlling strategies for micro-/nanomotors
Summary
Movement is crucial for all different types of lives existing in both macroscopic and micro-/nanoscopic environments. Inspired by the fantasy of naturally occurring motor proteins, researchers paid great attentions into synthetic micro-/nanomotors in the past decades. Led by pioneering contributions of Sen and Mallouk’s team and Ozin’s group, current work mainly focuses on the exploration of high-efficiency and high-speed synthetic micro-/ nanomotors that are able to convert chemical energy into autonomous propulsion [4–6]. The research of synthetic self-propelled micro-/nanomotors has rapidly developed in last few decades [4–9]. Fabricating micro-/ nanomotors with individual functional parts, smartly and precisely controlling motors are still extremely challenging. Despite of the significant development and advances in micro-/ nanomotors, challenges are still remained to find specific relevant applications, such as biologically compatible fuels, etc. The reported work on the propulsion mechanisms, fabrication methods, propulsion controlling, and applications of synthetic self-propelled platinum-based micro-/nanomotors will be presented and discussed
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