High-Performance Liquid Crystal Elastomer Fibers via a Tandem Alignment Strategy

Liquid crystal elastomer (LCE) fibers have shown great potential as shape-memory soft materials due to their large and reversible deformation capacity. However, fabrication methods for LCE fibers with ultrafast thermal response and the exploration of the factors influencing their thermal actuation performance remain limited. A tandem alignment strategy based on electrospinning is presented to fabricate highly aligned LCE fibers. These LCE fibers achieve an order parameter of up to 0.78 and exhibit exceptional actuation performance under thermal stimulation, including an actuation strain of 80%, an actuation speed of 1485% s^-1, and a peak power density of 6105 W kg^-1. Furthermore, the actuation performance can be significantly enhanced by resonance. Under constant heating conditions, modulation of the heating frequency enables the actuation speed of the LCE fibers to be amplified up to 10-fold, achieving bioinspired energy efficiency optimization similar to the wing-flapping of insects. The LCE fibers demonstrate promising applicability in scenarios requiring ultrafast and efficient thermal actuation.