Abstract:

Facing the lack of modernity and innovation in the current polymer science laboratory course during undergraduate education, this experiment proposes a new project for the preparation of photo-thermal responsive soft actuating hydrogel materials based on the combination of UV-initiated polymerization and in situ oxidation polymerization. The proposed experiment will first prepare thermal-responsive poly(N-isopropylacrylamide) (PNIPAM) hydrogel through UV-initiated polymerization. Then the conducting polymer with photo-thermal effect was further introduced into the PNIPAM hydrogel networks based on in situ oxidation polymerization to obtain composite hydrogel with photo-thermal responsive actuating features. Finally, the smart responsive actuating performance of the prepared composite actuating hydrogel was characterized through exposing the hydrogel under NIR irradiation. The proposed experiment focuses on the research hotspot of functional polymer materials, covering both the preparation of polymer materials based on basic polymerization methods and the characterization of functional polymer materials with specific features. The proposed experiment will not only consolidate students' understanding of polymer polymerization methods, but also expand students' knowledge of the research frontier of functional polymer materials. The proposed experiment possesses innovation and challenge, which is highly beneficial for improving students' ability and quality.

Key words: Photo-thermal responsive, Soft actuating material, Hydrogel, UV-initiated polymerization, In situ oxidation polymerization