Chunhong Ye1, Svetoslav V. Nikolov2, Rossella Calabrese3, Amir Dindar4, Alexander Alexeev2, Bernard Kippelen4, David L. Kaplan3, Vladimir V. Tsukruk1
1School of Materials Science and Engineering Georgia Institute of Technology Atlanta GA 30332 USA
2Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology
3Department of Biomedical Engineering, Tufts University, 4, Colby street, Medford, MA 02155 (USA)
4School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology
Tóm tắt
AbstractWe have demonstrated the facile formation of reversible and fast self‐rolling biopolymer microstructures from sandwiched active–passive, silk‐on‐silk materials. Both experimental and modeling results confirmed that the shape of individual sheets effectively controls biaxial stresses within these sheets, which can self‐roll into distinct 3D structures including microscopic rings, tubules, and helical tubules. This is a unique example of tailoring self‐rolled 3D geometries through shape design without changing the inner morphology of active bimorph biomaterials. In contrast to traditional organic‐soluble synthetic materials, we utilized a biocompatible and biodegradable biopolymer that underwent a facile aqueous layer‐by‐layer (LbL) assembly process for the fabrication of 2D films. The resulting films can undergo reversible pH‐triggered rolling/unrolling, with a variety of 3D structures forming from biopolymer structures that have identical morphology and composition.
