Electroactive Ionic Soft Actuators with Monolithically Integrated Gold Nanocomposite Electrodes |
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Authors: | Yunsong Yan Tommaso Santaniello Luca Giacomo Bettini Chloé Minnai Andrea Bellacicca Riccardo Porotti Ilaria Denti Gabriele Faraone Marco Merlini Cristina Lenardi Paolo Milani |
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Affiliation: | 1. Interdisciplinary Centre for Nanostructured Materials and Interfaces (CIMaINa), Physics Department, University of Milan, Milan, Italy;2. SEMM—European School of Molecular Medicine, Campus IFOM‐IEO, Milan, Italy;3. Department of Earth Science “Ardito Desio”, University of Milan, Milan, Italy |
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Abstract: | Electroactive ionic gel/metal nanocomposites are produced by implanting supersonically accelerated neutral gold nanoparticles into a novel chemically crosslinked ion conductive soft polymer. The ionic gel consists of chemically crosslinked poly(acrylic acid) and polyacrylonitrile networks, blended with halloysite nanoclays and imidazolium‐based ionic liquid. The material exhibits mechanical properties similar to that of elastomers (Young's modulus ≈ 0.35 MPa) together with high ionic conductivity. The fabrication of thin (≈100 nm thick) nanostructured compliant electrodes by means of supersonic cluster beam implantation (SCBI) does not significantly alter the mechanical properties of the soft polymer and provides controlled electrical properties and large surface area for ions storage. SCBI is cost effective and suitable for the scaleup manufacturing of electroactive soft actuators. This study reports the high‐strain electromechanical actuation performance of the novel ionic gel/metal nanocomposites in a low‐voltage regime (from 0.1 to 5 V), with long‐term stability up to 76 000 cycles with no electrode delamination or deterioration. The observed behavior is due to both the intrinsic features of the ionic gel (elasticity and ionic transport capability) and the electrical and morphological features of the electrodes, providing low specific resistance (<100 Ω cm?2), high electrochemical capacitance (≈mF g?1), and minimal mechanical stress at the polymer/metal composite interface upon deformation. |
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Keywords: | electroactive polymers nanocomposites smart materials soft actuators soft robotics |
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