Chengyi Hou: Graphene-Paper-Origami as a Multi-Responsive Water-Driven Actuator

posted 1 Jun 2016, 07:15 by info admin
1 Department of Chemistry, Technical University of Denmark, Kongens Lyngby, Denmark. 
2 State Key Laboratory for Modification of Chemical Fibers and Polymer Materials, College of Materials Science and Engineering, Donghua University, Shanghai, China.


Mechanical actuators driven by water, which can timely respond to multiple stimuli with  a large deformation and can generate high stress, have promising applications in artificial muscles, motors, and electromagnetic generators. However, matching all these requirements in a single device remains a challenge. In this talk, I present an attempt of fabricating low-cost graphene nanomaterial based construct that enables to undergo reversible deformation with high performance [1, 2]. The device is based on monolayered graphene papers consisting of gradient hybrid reduced graphene oxide (rGO) and graphene oxide (GO) components. The overall fabrication procedure can be carried out at room temperature with economical, scalable, and environmentally friendly advantages. A functional device ("Graphene Origami") composed of this graphene paper can (i) adopt predesigned shapes, (ii) walk, and (iii) turn a corner. These processes can be remote-controlled by gentle light or heating. It is believed that this self-folding material holds potential for a wide range of applications such as sensing, artificial muscles, and robotics.

[1] Sci. Adv. 2015;1:e1500533 (Highlighted by Nature, Science, Nano Today, etc.)
[2] Sci. Rep. 2015, 5, 9503 | DOI: 10.1038/srep09503


I received my Ph.D from Donghua University, China in 2014. I am currently a H.C. Ørsted-Marie Curie research fellow at DTU, Denmark. My research focuses on design, three-dimensional assembly and property of stimuli-responsive graphene-based hybrids and nanomaterials. The potential applications of these new materials as electronic skin, micro-reactors, artificial muscle and three-dimensional biological scaffolds have been systematically investigated. Over 20 of my research articles on this topic have been published on Science Advances, Advanced Materials, Nano Energy, Scientific Reports, Nanoscale, Journal of Materials Chemistry, Carbon etc. Relative publications have been highlighted by Nature, Science, C&EN, MaterialsViewsChina and etc.


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