How to tailor flexible silicone elastomers with mechanical integrity: a tutorial review

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Abstract

The tutorial aims to equip the beginners in silicone research with the knowledge to formulate recipes and process elastomer networks, targeting specific properties related to soft applications such as stretchable electronics without compromising the mechanical integrity of the elastomer. In doing so, we hope to stimulate further research in the area of tailor-made soft silicone elastomers for novel applications and allow researchers to bypass the limitations imposed by the use of commercially available silicone elastomer formulations. Silicone elastomers are widely used due to the favourable properties, such as flexibility, durable dielectric insulation, barrier properties against environmental contaminants and stress-absorbing properties over a wide range of temperatures ≈ −100 °C to 250 °C. For research on flexible electronics and other emerging technologies, the most commonly utilised silicone elastomer formulation is Sylgard 184 which is easier to process than most other commercially available silicone elastomers, due to the fact that the premixes have low viscosity. Furthermore, curing is robust and not as sensitive to poisoning as other silicone elastomer formulations. However, Sylgard 184 is not suitable for all fields of research that require flexible and stretchable silicones. When much softer networks are needed, the Sylgard 184 premixes are either mixed in non-stoichiometric ratios, or they are blended with softer types of commercially available elastomers, which compromise the mechanical integrity of the elastomer. Therefore, it is advantageous for researchers to formulate their own custom-made silicone elastomers and not depend on premade formulations which often harbour a few unknown components.

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Flexible and Stretchable Physical Sensor Integrated Platforms for Wearable Human-Activity Monitoringand Personal Healthcare.

Tran Quang Trung, Nae-Eung Lee (2016)

Flexible and stretchable physical sensors that can measure and quantify electrical signals generated by human activities are attracting a great deal of attention as they have unique characteristics, such as ultrathinness, low modulus, light weight, high flexibility, and stretchability. These flexible and stretchable physical sensors conformally attached on the surface of organs or skin can provide a new opportunity for human-activity monitoring and personal healthcare. Consequently, in recent years there has been considerable research effort devoted to the development of flexible and stretchable physical sensors to fulfill the requirements of future technology, and much progress has been achieved. Here, the most recent developments of flexible and stretchable physical sensors are described, including temperature, pressure, and strain sensors, and flexible and stretchable sensor-integrated platforms. The latest successful examples of flexible and stretchable physical sensors for the detection of temperature, pressure, and strain, as well as their novel structures, technological innovations, and challenges, are reviewed first. In the next section, recent progress regarding sensor-integrated wearable platforms is overviewed in detail. Some of the latest achievements regarding self-powered sensor-integrated wearable platform technologies are also reviewed. Further research direction and challenges are also proposed to develop a fully sensor-integrated wearable platform for monitoring human activity and personal healthcare in the near future.

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Solvent compatibility of poly(dimethylsiloxane)-based microfluidic devices.

Jessamine Lee, Cheolmin Park, George Whitesides (2003)

This paper describes the compatibility of poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS) with organic solvents; this compatibility is important in considering the potential of PDMS-based microfluidic devices in a number of applications, including that of microreactors for organic reactions. We considered three aspects of compatibility: the swelling of PDMS in a solvent, the partitioning of solutes between a solvent and PDMS, and the dissolution of PDMS oligomers in a solvent. Of these three parameters that determine the compatibility of PDMS with a solvent, the swelling of PDMS had the greatest influence. Experimental measurements of swelling were correlated with the solubility parameter, delta (cal(1/2) cm(-3/2)), which is based on the cohesive energy densities, c (cal/cm(3)), of the materials. Solvents that swelled PDMS the least included water, nitromethane, dimethyl sulfoxide, ethylene glycol, perfluorotributylamine, perfluorodecalin, acetonitrile, and propylene carbonate; solvents that swelled PDMS the most were diisopropylamine, triethylamine, pentane, and xylenes. Highly swelling solvents were useful for extracting contaminants from bulk PDMS and for changing the surface properties of PDMS. The feasibility of performing organic reactions in PDMS was demonstrated by performing a Diels-Alder reaction in a microchannel.