Stimulation of the bistable, residual magnetic, read/write memory, and logic gate functions of the stimulus-responsive polymer
Stimulus-responding materials can change their state in response to external triggers. This allows the physical, chemical, and biological properties of their physical, chemical, or environmental stimuli to be specifically regulated to achieve certain specific functions. Therefore, response materials are widely studied in areas such as sensors, actuators, and targeted drug delivery. If transitions between states exhibit a bistable lag, switching between different states is capable of reading and writing information. Unconventional non-magnetic materials with double stability have recently been shown to be used for thermally responsive polymers for folded states, vitreous and main-guest functionalization of origami structures. With two state control variables, the implementation of logical operations will also become possible. Logic gate response has been used to control sol/gel transitions, hydrogel degradation, or nanocarriage decomposition for drug delivery applications. For responding materials, both bistable and logic gate functions have so far been achieved by employing chemical reactions, which leads to bistable states in terms of chemical state and kinetics, which is interesting, but it is still difficult to achieve compared to the inherent physical bistable states of ferromagnetic and ferroelectric materials. If intrinsic bistables can be demonstrated in the response material, this would be a decisive step in encoding memories, read/write information, and even logical operations in a wide range of response materials.
Recently, the team of Stephan Förster at the Ulich Research Center in Germany demonstrated the intrinsic lag of polymer volume phase transitions for bistable, remagnetism and read/write information storage. The research team used pens and lasers to thermally write information to the thin-layer display device. One of the most widely used types of response materials is poly-N-isopropyl acrylamide homopolymer and two-block polymer. Demonstrates the "and" logic gate function. In addition, an unconventional state of memory was found, in which information is visible in a lagging window and not visible at higher temperatures, which allows the encoded information to be hidden. Since hysteresis is inherent in response materials that are very common, this principle of encoding and storing information may be applicable to a wide range of response materials. The study was published in Advanced Materials.
Article links:
J. Michalska-Walkowiak, B. Forster, S. Hauschild, et al. Bistability, Remanence, Read/write-memory and Logic Gate Function via A Stimuli Responsive Polymer[J]. Adv Mater, 2022: e2108833.
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