Toward 4D printing with structural colors
Jun 2022, phys.org
While you were sleeping, 3D printing makes a huge evolutionary leap - now making "structural colors" directly into the nanoscopic surface textures of the materials. What better name to call it than 4D printing:
3D printing with stimuli-responsive materials, called 4D printing. 4D printing enables 3D printed structures to change its configurations over time and is used in a wide variety of fields such as soft robotics, flexible electronics, and medical devices.Structural coloration occurs on surfaces with a nanostructure with dimensions similar to those of the wavelength of the incident light (typically below a micron). These ordered nanostructures are known as photonic crystals.
But it's not just about printing structurally-memetic dragonfly iridescence that changes depending on the light. It's about the surface textures changing over time, and in response to any number of stimuli in the environment. Too hot? Turns red. Cyanide gas in the air? Turns green.
Humidity-responsive color changing ink for extrusion 3D printing reversibly changes volume and reflected color based on hydration state.
But again it's not just about changing colors, it's about the materials sensing its environment and changing its structure in response:
"Ideally, by including responsive elements in these polymers, we can create materials that can both sense and respond to their environment, perhaps even allowing communication between individual devices as well to generate a level of autonomy for a collection of individual units," Debije concludes.
via Eindhoven University of Technology: Jeroen A. H. P. Sol et al, Direct Ink Writing of 4D Structural Colors, Advanced Functional Materials (2022). DOI: 10.1002/adfm.202201766
Natural mineral hackmanite demonstrates highly repeatable color change ability
Jun 2022, phys.org
"Structural Breathing" he says.
Also, radiation exposure detection:
Hackmanite changes color when it's exposed to ultraviolet radiation, and without wearing out, but until now we didn't know why.It can do this repeatedly without wearing out because it does not use the change in color of the organic molecules the make it up, like similar minerals, but by using structural color -- a change in the position of the molecules, but not their composition."In this research, we found out for the first time that there is actually a structural change involved in the color change process, as well. When the color changes, sodium atoms in the structure move relatively far away from their usual places and then return back. This can be called 'structural breathing,' and it does not destroy the structure even if it is repeated a large number of times,"
via Intelligent Materials Research Group at the Department of Chemistry of the University of Turku, Finland: Pauline Colinet et al, The structural origin of the efficient photochromism in natural minerals, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2022). DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2202487119
Engineers repurpose 19th-century photography technique to make stretchy, color-changing films
Aug 2022, phys.org
By applying a 19th-century color photography technique to modern holographic materials, an MIT team has printed large-scale images onto elastic materials that when stretched can transform their color, reflecting different wavelengths as the material is strained.
The eureka:
While puzzling over how to resolve this challenge of getting microscale control and scalability together in structural color technology, Miller happened to visit the MIT Museum, where a curator talked him through an exhibit on holography, a technique that produces three-dimensional images by superimposing two light beams onto a physical material. "I realized what they do in holography is kind of the same thing that nature does with structural color."
via MIT: Benjamin Harvey Miller et al, Scalable optical manufacture of dynamic structural colour in stretchable materials, Nature Materials (2022). DOI: 10.1038/s41563-022-01318-x
Post Script:
Researchers add antireflection coatings to complex 3D printed micro-optical systems
Apr 2022, phys.org
Another nod to the future where everything becomes a computer -- the mirrors (for optical circuits, for optical computers) are sprayed right onto the 3D printed objects themselves.
Imagine being skinned in nanocrystal photon routers.
via University of Stuttgart: Simon Ristok et al, Atomic layer deposition of conformal anti-reflective coatings on complex 3D printed micro-optical systems, Optical Materials Express (2022). DOI: 10.1364/OME.454475
Image credit: AI Art - Skinned in Nanocrystals
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Bonus: AI Art - Optical Computer Skin
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