title: Controlled morphology of thin film silicon integrated with environmentally responsive hydrogels.
abstract: Environmentally responsive hydrogels hold multiple important applications. However, the functionality of these materials alone is often limited in comparison to other materials like silicon; thus, there is a need to integrate soft and hard materials for the advancement of environmentally sensitive materials. Here we demonstrate the capability of integrating a thermoresponsive hydrogel, poly(N-isopropylacrylamide), with thin film silicon ribbons, enabling the stiff silicon ribbons to become adaptive and drivable by the soft environmentally sensitive substrate. This integration provides a means of mechanical buckling of the thin silicon film due to changes in environmental stimuli (e.g., temperature, pH). We also investigate how advanced lithographic techniques can be used to generate patterned deformation on the aforementioned integrated structures. Furthermore, we explore multilayer hybrid hydrogel structures formed by the integration of different types of hydrogels that have tunable curvatures under the influence of different stimuli. Silicon thin film integration on such tunable curvature substrates reveal characteristic reversible buckling of the thin film in the presence of multiple stimuli. These results open new opportunities for developing stretchable and intelligent devices for multiple applications.
authors.affiliation: School for Engineering of Matter, Transport, and Energy, Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona 85287, USA.
authors.forename: Prithwish
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Chatterjee
authors.forename: Yuping
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Pan
authors.forename: Eric C
authors.initials: EC
authors.lastname: Stevens
authors.forename: Teng
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Ma
authors.forename: Hanqing
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Jiang
authors.forename: Lenore L
authors.initials: LL
authors.lastname: Dai
mesh_terms: D000178:Acrylamides / Q000138:chemical synthesis / Q000737:chemistry*; D000180:Acrylic Resins; D020100:Hydrogels / Q000138:chemical synthesis / Q000737:chemistry*; D010316:Particle Size; D011108:Polymers / Q000138:chemical synthesis / Q000737:chemistry*; D012825:Silicon / Q000737:chemistry*; D013499:Surface Properties
chemical_list: D000178:Acrylamides; D000180:Acrylic Resins; D020100:Hydrogels; D011108:Polymers; C052970:poly-N-isopropylacrylamide; D012825:Silicon