Researchers from Polymer Technology (TU/e Department of Chemical Engineering and Chemistry) have fabricated plastic ‘artificial muscles’ that move under the influence of light. The artificial muscles, with a shape of flimsy flaps less than one millimeter long, have been designed to actuate fluids on a ‘lab-on-a-chip’: a microchip for analyzing blood or saliva. The researchers describe the process in an article in Nature Materials published online on Sunday June 28.

The response of the ‘artificial muscle’ to a lamp being switched on: the flap curls up under the influence of the light.

The publication has sprung from the doctoral research by first author dr. ir. Casper van Oosten, who obtained his PhD last March. The two co-authors are dr. ir. Cees Bastiaansen (assistant professor with Polymer Technology and also affiliated with Queen Mary University of London) and prof. dr. Dick Broer (who works for Philips and is a part-time professor with Polymer Technology at TU/e).

The extraordinary element in this publication is that it has now been demonstrated that by means of relatively simple and low-cost techniques (the flaps were printed with an inkjet printer) miniature moving components can be made that react to light. By using light instead of electricity to actuate them, the need for -expensive- electrodes has been avoided. Van Oosten expects that at some point the artificial muscles can be applied in all kinds of MEMS (MicroElectroMechanical Systems), such as the said lab-on-a-chip application. MEMS can also be found in airbags, CD players and mobile phones.

Cilia
The microactuators consist of two parts, each of which reacts to a different color (i.e. wavelength) of light. By illuminating the flaps alternately with the two colors of light, you can induce them to make an asymmetric curling movement, through which they set a fluid moving. In their work the researchers were inspired by so-called cilia on the internal wall of our trachea: they make similar movements to expel mucus. Unicellular slipper animalcules also use cilia to propel themselves through the water.

Contact: Jim Heirbaut, Communicatie Expertise Centrum, tel. 040 – 247 21 10, e-mail J.Heirbaut@remove-this.tue.nl

Source: Technische Universiteit Eindhoven