There is a need for soft microactuators, especially for biomedical applications. We have developed a microfabrication process to create such soft, on-chip polymer based microactuators that can operate in air. The on-chip microactuators were fabricated using standard photolithographic techniques and wet etching, combined with special designed process to micropattern the electroactive polymer polypyrrole that drives the microactuators. By immobilizing a UV-patternable gel containing a liquid electrolyte on top of the electroactive polypyrrole layer, actuation in air was achieved although with reduced movement. Further optimization of the processing is currently on-going. The result shows the possibility to batch fabricate complex microsystems such as microrobotics and micromanipulators based on these solid-state on-chip microactuators using microfabrication methods including standard photolithographic processes.
CITATION STYLE
Zhong, Y., Lundemo, S., & Jager, E. W. H. (2018). Development of polypyrrole based solid-state on-chip microactuators using photolithography. Smart Materials and Structures, 27(7). https://doi.org/10.1088/1361-665X/aabe42
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