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Photoinduced Reversible Solid-to-Liquid Transitions and Directional Photofluidization of Azobenzene-containing Polymers

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Abstract

Photoinduced reversible liquefaction and solidification of polymers enable processing and healing of polymers with light. Some azobenzene-containing polymers (azopolymers) exhibit two types of photoinduced liquefaction properties: photoinduced reversible solid-to-liquid transition and directional photofluidization. For the first type, light switches the glass transition temperature (Tg) values of azopolymers and induces reversible solid-to-liquid transitions. For the second type, polarized light guides solid azopolymers to flow along the polarization direction. Here, we compare the two types of photoliquefaction and discuss their mechanisms. Recent progresses and applications based on photoliquefaction of azopolymers are also highlighted.

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Acknowledgments

This work was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 51973204) and the Thousand Talents Plan and Anhui Provincial Natural Science Foundation (No. 1908085MB38).

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  1. Chinese Academy of Sciences Key Laboratory of Soft Matter Chemistry, Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, Anhui Key Laboratory of Optoelectronic Science and Technology, Department of Polymer Science and Engineering, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, China

    Shuo-Feng Liang, Chen Nie, Jie Yan, Qi-Jin Zhang & Si Wu

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Liang, SF., Nie, C., Yan, J. et al. Photoinduced Reversible Solid-to-Liquid Transitions and Directional Photofluidization of Azobenzene-containing Polymers. Chin J Polym Sci 39, 1225–1234 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10118-021-2519-x

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