Reactive Jetting of High Viscosity Nanocomposites for Dielectric Elastomer Actuation

The layer-by-layer nature of additive manufacturing is well matched to the layer construction stacked dielectric actuators, with inkjet printing offering a unique opportunity due its droplet-on-demand capability, suitable for multi-material processing at high resolution. This paper demonstrates use viscosity, jetting deposit two-part reactive inks functionalized nanofillers digitally manufacture elastomers soft robots precision, and shape manipulation. Graphene-based fillers, including graphene oxide (GO) thermally reduced oxides (TRGOs), have been incorporated into polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) matrix low loading (below percolation threshold). Consequently, constant elastomer dramatically increases (by 97%) compared neat PDMS, yielding more than 20-fold increase in electric-field induced electromechanical contraction (from 0.3 6.7%). study shows that oxygen-functionalities present GO TRGOs, which possess moderate conductivity, improve dispersion those fillers polymer matrices, thus significantly improving composites. Inkjet high-performance, electroactive composites enables high-speed, reliable fabrication monolithic artificial muscles (leading stronger, cheaper, capable robotic devices) provides vital stepping stone towards fully additively manufactured robots.