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Journal of Bionic Engineering ›› 2020, Vol. 17 ›› Issue (3): 405-420.doi: 10.1007/s42235-020-0033-4

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Building Magnetoresponsive Composite Elastomers for Bionic Locomotion Applications

Yi Lei1, Zhizhi Sheng2,3, Jian Zhang2, Jing Liu2, Wei Lv1, Xu Hou1,2,3*   

  1. 1. Department of Physics, Research Institute for Biomimetics and Soft Matter, Jiujiang Research Institute, College of Physical Science 
    and Technology, Xiamen University, Xiamen 361005, China
    2. State Key Laboratory of Physical Chemistry of Solid Surfaces, College of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Xiamen University, Xiamen 361005, China 
    3. Collaborative Innovation Center of Chemistry for Energy Materials, Xiamen University, Xiamen 361005, China
  • Received:2020-02-22 Revised:2020-03-11 Online:2020-05-10 Published:2020-05-18
  • Contact: Xu Hou E-mail:houx@xmu.edu.cn
  • About author:Yi Lei1, Zhizhi Sheng2,3, Jian Zhang2, Jing Liu2, Wei Lv1, Xu Hou1,2,3*

Abstract: The ability of natural living organisms, transferring deformations into locomotion, has attracted researchers’ increasing attention in building bionic actuators and smart systems. As a typical category of functional materials, magnetoresponsive composite elastomers, comprised of flexible elastomer matrices and rigid magnetic particles, have been playing critical roles in this field of research due to their dynamic changes in response to applied magnetic field direction and intensity. The magnetically driven bionic actuators based on mag-netoresponsive composite elastomers have been developed to achieve some specific functions in some special fields. For instance, under the control of the applied magnetic field, the bionic actuators can not only generate time-varying deformation, but also motion in diverse environments, suggesting new possibilities for target gripping and directional transporting especially in the field of artificial soft robots and biological engineering. Therefore, this review comprehensively introduces the component, fabrication, and bionic locomotion application of magnetoresponsive composite elastomers. Moreover, existing challenges and future perspectives are further discussed.

Key words: magnetoresponsive composite elastomers, components, fabrication, bionic locomotion