Pattern Memory Surface (PMS) with Dynamic Wrinkles for Unclonable Anticounterfeiting

Abstract

To avoid the losses caused by counterfeit commodity, documents and currency, various anticounterfeiting strategies have aroused an intensive interest and have been developed rapidly; however, obtaining unclonable anticounterfeiting technology that is sufficiently adaptable for industry-suitable authentication is still a challenge. Here, we report a facile yet effective anticounterfeiting strategy by utilizing pattern memory surface with NIR-driven dynamic wrinkles, which can be used as dynamic biomimetic fingerprints. The randomness and unpredictability of the wrinkles' morphology enable them to be analogous to the minutiae of fingerprints. The dynamic nature of the fingerprint-like wrinkles endows them with hidden information to further improve security levels, and their NIR-responsiveness can help maintain a nearly identical topography during the cycles of erasure and regeneration, thus truly realizing unclonable anticounterfeiting. On the basis of these characteristics of NIR-driven dynamic wrinkles, such as simple preparation and easy readout, unique and unclonable identity tags were fabricated for antique authentication, which can be further combined with fluorescence patterns to achieve multiple anticounterfeiting technologies.