All-polymer based polymorph skin with controllable surface texture

Abstract

Smart skins are integrating an increasing number of functionalities to improve the interactions between the equipped systems (robots or artificial systems) and their ambient environment. Here, we introduce a controllable texture as a new functionality, based on an innovative soft technology that leverages the strong electro-mechanical coupling of our all-polymer design, which can be easily embedded to a wide range of systems. The device comprises a polymer-based heating element [doped PEDOT:PSS (poly-(3,4 ethylenedioxythiophene): poly (styrene sulfonic acid))], a polymer-based soft actuator (Ecoflex 00–50/ethanol) and a polymer-based casing [PDMS (polydimethylsiloxane)]. We introduce a smart pipe prototype module and use our controllable polymorph skin to tailor the interaction between the pipe and the fluid. This allows us to obtain a 50% reduction of the friction coefficient in turbulent regime, between non-actuated and actuated configurations. This concept may find applications in engineering fields such as smart skin-based touch control and controllable friction coefficients.