Stretchable hydrogels with low hysteresis and anti-fatigue fracture based on polyprotein cross-linkers

Abstract

High stretchability, low hysteresis and anti-fatigue fracture are essential for hydrogel-based devices but it is rare to achieve. Here the authors demonstrate a hydrogel design using tandem-repeat proteins as the cross-linkers and random coiled polymers as the percolating network which results in high stretchability, low hysteresis and high fracture toughness.