Melanin-inspired polymers are currently the focus of growing interest for a wide range of applications ranging from energy to biomedical area. Whilst researchers have made numerous attempts to prepare and utilize polydopamine nanoparticles (PDA NPs), they have made limited progress in developing and discovering another typical functional mimic of natural melanin, poly (levodopa) (P(L-DOPA)) NPs, probably due to the lack of facile synthetic strategies towards satisfactory structural and functional control of melanin-like NPs. Herein, we reported a one-pot preparation method towards P(L-DOPA) NPs with good yields and controllable size/property in an aqueous solution assisted by various metal ions (i.e., Ni(II), Mg(II), Ca(II), Fe(III), Mn(II), Co (II), Zn(II) and Cd(II)). Interestingly, the resulting P(L-DOPA) NPs exhibited enhanced light absorption and photothermal behaviors compared with well-established PDA NPs, which can be employed to further fabricate kinds of photothermal composite actuators with promising performances such as folding, switching, and forward-moving. This study offers a facile and robust way to synthesize new synthetic melanins beyond PDA, and facilitates further functional discovery and evolution of melanin-inspired polymers and composites.

目前，受黑素启发的聚合物成为人们关注的焦点，涉及从能源到生物医学领域的广泛应用。尽管研究人员已进行了许多尝试来制备和利用聚多巴胺纳米颗粒（PDA NP），但在开发和发现天然黑色素的另一种典型功能模拟物聚（左旋多巴）（P（L-DOPA））NP方面却取得了有限的进展。缺乏可行的合成策略来实现令人满意的黑色素样NP的结构和功能控制。在本文中，我们报道了一种由P（L-DOPA）NPs组成的一锅法制备方法，该方法在各种金属离子（即：，Ni（II），Mg（II），Ca（II），Fe（III），Mn（II），Co（II），Zn（II）和Cd（II））。有趣的是，与成熟的PDA NPs相比，所得的P（L-DOPA）NPs表现出增强的光吸收和光热性能，可用于进一步制造具有可折叠性能，例如折叠，切换和正向运动的光热复合致动器。移动。这项研究提供了一种简便而强大的方法来合成PDA以外的新型合成黑色素，并促进了黑色素启发的聚合物和复合材料的进一步功能发现和进化。