title: Design of self-oscillating gels and application to biomimetic actuators.
abstract: As a novel biomimetic polymer, we have developed polymer gels with an autonomous self-oscillating function. This was achieved by utilizing oscillating chemical reactions, called the Belousov-Zhabotinsky (BZ) reaction, which is recognized as a chemical model for understanding several autonomous phenomena in biological systems. Under the coexistence of the reactants, the polymer gel undergoes spontaneous swelling-deswelling changes without any on-off switching by external stimuli. In this review, our recent studies on the self-oscillating polymer gels and application to biomimetic actuators are summarized.
authors.affiliation: Department of Materials Engineering, Graduate School of Engineering, The University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-8656, Japan. ryo@cross.t.u-tokyo.ac.jp
authors.forename: Ryo
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Yoshida
mesh_terms: D040761:Biomimetic Materials / Q000737:chemistry*; D005782:Gels / Q000737:chemistry*; D008956:Models, Chemical; D011108:Polymers / Q000737:chemistry*
chemical_list: D005782:Gels; D011108:Polymers