Bioinspired Liquid Crystalline Spinning Enables Scalable Fabrication of High‐Performing Fibrous Artificial Muscles

Abstract Leveraging liquid crystal elastomers (LCEs) to realize scalable fabrication of high‐performing fibrous artificial muscles is of particular interest because these active soft materials can provide large, reversible, programmable deformations upon environmental stimuli. High‐performing fibrous LCEs require the used processing technology to enable shaping LCEs into micro‐scale fine fibers as thin as possible while achieving macroscopic LC orientation, which however remains a daunting challenge. Here, a bioinspired spinning technology is reported that allows for continuous, high‐speed production (fabrication speed up to 8400 m h −1 ) of thin and aligned LCE microfibers combined with rapid deformation…

• NN
  National Natural Science Foundation of China

  Awards: 51873197, 52273111