Advanced Intelligent Systems (Mar 2023)

Humidity‐Driven High‐Performance Electrothermal Actuation of Vertically Stacked 2D PtTe2 Layers/Cellulose Nanofibers

  • Changhyeon Yoo,
  • Sang Sub Han,
  • Emmanuel Okogbue,
  • Tae-Sung Bae,
  • Jae Hyuck Jang,
  • Justin Cao,
  • Hee-Suk Chung,
  • Yeonwoong Jung

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1002/aisy.202200269
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 5, no. 3
pp. n/a – n/a

Abstract

Read online

A new type of soft actuators based on a vertical stack of nanoporous 2,2,6,6‐tetramethylpiperidine‐1‐oxyl‐oxidized cellulose nanofibers (TOCNs) and atomically thin 2D platinum ditelluride (PtTe2) layers is reported. The actuation of TOCNs is driven by the interfacing 2D PtTe2 layers whose electrothermal proficiency precisely controls their hydration/dehydration states sensitive to mechanical deformation. These vertically stacked TOCN/2D PtTe2 actuators present excellent actuation characteristics such as high linearity of bending curvature versus applied voltage and well‐preserved reversibility during cyclic operations. Most notably, they exhibit an extremely large weight‐lifting ratio, i.e., ≈1000 times the mass of the TOCN layers, confirming superior mechanical robustness. Furthermore, complicated actuations such as twisting in a 3D manner are demonstrated by judiciously controlling the surface wettability of TOCN layers. This study unveils opportunities for CNFs and 2D materials for actuator applications, as well as suggests new design strategies broadly applicable to soft robotics and biomimetic devices.

Keywords