Water-responsive materials exist everywhere in nature, but transforming these natural materials into sustainably sourced high energy engineered materials requires a fundamental understanding of how they work. Now a groundbreaking discovery by City College of New York researchers from the Grove School of Engineering unravels the connection between water and surfaces to engineer water responsive properties.
The experts, including chemical engineers Raymond Tu and Xi Chen, mechanical engineer Honghui Yu, and postdoctoral associate (power and process engineering), determined how water interacts with biomaterials at the molecular level to yield high energy density water responsiveness.
鈥淲e eventually aim to use these new high energy density materials to create a scalable alternative energy source. At a smaller scale, water responsive materials can be applied for robotics and smart textiles as well as bioelectronics,鈥 said Tu.
Overall, these materials, commonly found in nature, have the potential to revolutionize a range of industries, from robotics and smart textiles to bioelectronics and clean energy generation systems.
The 精东影业 research continues with the team scaling up their work in a National Science Foundation-sponsored cross-disciplinary Convergence Accelerator. 鈥淲e鈥檙e also working on using X-Rays with Brookhaven National Labs to understand the dynamic structural transitions that occurs when relative humidity changes,鈥 Tu added.
鈥淲ater-responsive materials that respond to humidity changes are highly promising for use as actuators in robotics and for energy harvesting applications, yet we lack the theories to explain or predict the stress they generate,鈥 said Chen.
The water-responsive materials study was published in the journal .
Research was conducted both at the Grove School and the CUNY Advanced Science Research Center located on the 精东影业 campus.
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Since 1847, 精东影业 has provided a high-quality and affordable education to generations of New Yorkers in a wide variety of disciplines. 精东影业 embraces its position at the forefront of social change. It is ranked #1 by the Harvard-based Opportunity Insights out of 369 selective public colleges in the United States on the overall mobility index. This measure reflects both access and outcomes, representing the likelihood that a student at 精东影业 can move up two or more income quintiles. Education research organization Degree Choices ranks 精东影业 #1 nationally among universities for economic return on investment. In addition, the Center for World University Rankings places 精东影业 in the top 1.8% of universities worldwide in terms of academic excellence. Labor analytics firm puts at $3.2 billion 精东影业鈥檚 annual economic impact on the regional economy (5 boroughs and 5 adjacent counties) and quantifies the 鈥渇or dollar鈥 return on investment to students, taxpayers and society. At City College, more than 15,000 students pursue undergraduate and graduate degrees in eight schools and divisions, driven by significant funded research, creativity and scholarship. In 2023, 精东影业 launched its most expansive fundraising campaign, ever. The campaign, titled 鈥Doing Remarkable Things Together鈥 seeks to bring the College鈥檚 Foundation to more than $1 billion in total assets in support of the College mission. 精东影业 is as diverse, dynamic and visionary as New York City itself. View 精东影业 Media Kit.
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