title: Spongy Gels by a Top-Down Approach from Polymer Fibrous Sponges.
abstract: Ultralight cellular sponges offer a unique set of properties. We show here that solvent uptake by these sponges results in new gel-like materials, which we term spongy gels. The appearance of the spongy gels is very similar to classic organogels. Usually, organogels are formed by a bottom-up process. In contrast, the spongy gels are formed by a top-down approach that offers numerous advantages for the design of their properties, reproducibility, and stability. The sponges themselves represent the scaffold of a gel that could be filled with a solvent, and thereby form a mechanically stable gel-like material. The spongy gels are independent of a time-consuming or otherwise demanding in situ scaffold formation. As solvent evaporation from gels is a concern for various applications, we also studied solvent evaporation of wetting and non-wetting liquids dispersed in the sponge.
authors.affiliation: Macromolecular Chemistry, Bavarian Polymer Institute, University Bayreuth, Universitätsstrasse 30, 95440, Bayreuth, Germany.|College of Materials Science and Engineering, Nanjing Forest University, Nanjing, 210037, China.
authors.forename: Shaohua
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Jiang
authors.affiliation: Macromolecular Chemistry, Bavarian Polymer Institute, University Bayreuth, Universitätsstrasse 30, 95440, Bayreuth, Germany.
authors.forename: Gaigai
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Duan
authors.affiliation: Polymer Engineering, University Bayreuth, Universitätsstrasse 30, 95440, Bayreuth, Germany.
authors.forename: Ute
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Kuhn
authors.affiliation: Polymer Engineering, University Bayreuth, Universitätsstrasse 30, 95440, Bayreuth, Germany.
authors.forename: Michaela
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Mörl
authors.affiliation: Polymer Engineering, University Bayreuth, Universitätsstrasse 30, 95440, Bayreuth, Germany.
authors.forename: Volker
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Altstädt
authors.affiliation: Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, University of Illinois at Chicago, 842 W. Taylor Street, Chicago, IL, 60607, USA.
authors.forename: Alexander L
authors.initials: AL
authors.lastname: Yarin
authors.affiliation: Macromolecular Chemistry, Bavarian Polymer Institute, University Bayreuth, Universitätsstrasse 30, 95440, Bayreuth, Germany.
authors.forename: Andreas
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Greiner
keywords: electrospinning; gels; sponges