Abstract
Flexible and stretchable electronics are emerging in mainstream technologies and represent promising directions for future lifestyles. Multifunctional stretchable materials with a self-healing ability to resist mechanical damage are highly desirable but remain challenging to create. Here, we report a stretchable macromolecular elastomeric gel with the unique abilities of not only self-healing but also transient properties at room temperature. By inserting small molecule glycerol into hydroxyethylcellulose (HEC), forming a glycerol/hydroxyethylcellulose (GHEC) macromolecular elastomeric gel, dynamic hydrogen bonds occur between the HEC chain and the guest small glycerol molecules, which endows the GHEC with an excellent stretchability (304%) and a self-healing ability under ambient conditions. Additionally, the GHEC elastomeric gel is completely water-soluble, and its degradation rate can be tuned by adjusting the HEC molecular weight and the ratio of the HEC to glycerol. We demonstrate several flexible and stretchable electronics devices, such as self-healing conductors, transient transistors, and electronic skins for robots based on the GHEC elastomeric gel to illustrate its multiple functions.
Highlights
To meet the requirements of multifunctional flexible and stretchable transient electronics devices with a self-healing ability, a series of supramolecular GHEC elastomeric gels were synthesized by introducing different amounts of functional guest small glycerol molecules into the HEC matrix to form new elastomeric oil gels
GHEC elastomeric gel is stable and the weight changes of the GHEC gel are less than 0.5% under different temperatures (0~90 °C) at both 20 and 80% RH (Figure S1)
For the insertion of small glycerol molecules, the reformation of dynamic hydrogen bonds occurs between the HEC chains and the guest small glycerol molecules (Fig. 1), which endows the HEC supramolecular chains with mobility and makes the folded HEC molecular chains easier to straighten, inducing a higher stretchability for the GHEC compared with HEC (Fig. 2b)
Summary
Materials Hydroxyethylcellulose (HEC, 200, 2000, and 5000 mPa.s, 25 °C) was purchased from Shanghai Aladdin Industrial Corporation Co. Synthesis and fabrication of GHEC elastomeric gel film HEC (2 g) was added to deionized water Preparation of the self-healing electrode 5 mL 0.05 wt% AgNWs dispersion were dispersed into the 100 mL GHEC aqueous solution by stirring for 4 h. The mixture was poured into a quartz tank mold forming a self-healing AgNW/ GHEC elastomeric gel. Preparation of transient electronics The transient electronics were fabricated by patterning metal aluminum (Al) electrodes onto the GHEC films using electron beam evaporation via a shadow mask. The current measurements were performed by connecting two ends of the AgNW/ GHEC film with a digital source meter (Keithley 2602 A), using two copper wires as the electrodes to record the real-time electric current (I) of the film under a constant voltage (V0) of 2 V
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