Issue 24, 2017

A reversibly electro-controllable polymer brush for electro-switchable friction

Abstract

We report electrically switchable friction, which is reversibly manipulated by an external electric field via an electro-controllable polymer branched brush. The electro-controllable polymer branched brush, poly-sodium allyloxy hydroxypropyl sulfonate (poly-AHPS), was grafted onto an electrically conductive indium tin oxide (ITO) glass, and it demonstrated the capability of switching states by responding to the external electric field in a controllable manner. The two states of poly-AHPS branched brushes – stretched polymer brush arrays when negatively charged and rolled polymer knolls when positively charged – correspond to two different friction factors. Meanwhile, the shifting span for friction factors would be compressed by sandwiching a polar molecule medium or a nonpolar molecule medium, and exhibited a medium-controllable character. The proposed electric-field-responsive polymer brush is expected to be a manoeuvrable matrix for automatic control of friction, and to find wide application in automatization, intelligent manipulation and actuators.

Graphical abstract: A reversibly electro-controllable polymer brush for electro-switchable friction

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Communication
Submitted
14 Apr 2017
Accepted
25 May 2017
First published
25 May 2017

J. Mater. Chem. C, 2017,5, 5877-5881

A reversibly electro-controllable polymer brush for electro-switchable friction

H. Zeng, Y. Zhang, S. Mao, H. Nakajima and K. Uchiyama, J. Mater. Chem. C, 2017, 5, 5877 DOI: 10.1039/C7TC01624G

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