Recently, Professor Ge Qi's team from the Department of Mechanical and Energy Engineering at the Southern University of Science and Technology has made significant progress in the field of reconfigurable 4D printing technology, with their findings published in "Advanced Science".
4D printing, as an emerging interdisciplinary frontier research field, has become one of the hot research directions both domestically and internationally. Shape Memory Polymers (SMPs), due to their high modulus, have been widely used in 4D printing. However, most SMPs used for 4D printing are thermosetting materials that can only "remember" one permanent shape.
In recent years, some studies have introduced dynamic covalent networks into SMPs to achieve multiple shape reconfigurations. Nevertheless, existing dynamic covalent SMPs struggle to balance shape memory performance, deformation reconfiguration capability, and high-precision printability.
In response to this challenge, Professor Ge Qi's team has developed a high mechanical performance covalent adaptive network SMP, namely MRC-SMP, which can be used for digital light processing high-resolution 3D printing, enabling reconfigurable, large deformation, and high-precision 4D printing.
Research Illustration Provided by Southern University of Science and Technology
The covalent adaptable network also endows MRC-SMP with high bonding capability. For instance, three high-precision printed MRC-SMP lattice structures and an MRC-SMP connector, after welding and shape reconfiguration, form a grasping claw in a gripping state. This claw can be programmed to unfold initially, then recover to the gripping state through shape memory and lift heavy objects.
Furthermore, the reconfigurability of MRC-SMP combined with multi-material printing enables the fabrication of memory origami structures of any three-dimensional shape, significantly reducing the time to manufacture complex SMP origami structures. Multi-material origami is made with MRC-SMP as deformable hinges and high-temperature-resistant high-strength light-curable resin as rigid faces. The remarkable deformability of MRC-SMP allows for quickly reconfiguring a printed origami into multiple SMP origami. The high glass transition temperature of MRC-SMP ensures that the 3D origami structure has high rigidity and heavy load capacity at room temperature.
For more information, refer to the related paper: Link to the Paper
