Scotch tape finds new use as grasping 'smart material'

Scotch tape, a versatile household staple and a mainstay of holiday gift-wrapping, may have a new scientific application as a shape-changing "smart material."

Researchers used a laser to form slender half-centimeter-long fingers out of the tape. When exposed to water, the four wispy fingers morph into a tiny robotic claw that captures water droplets.

The innovation could be used to collect water samples for environmental testing, said Babak Ziaie, a Purdue University professor of electrical and computer engineering and biomedical engineering.

The Scotch tape - made from a cellulose-acetate sheet and an adhesive - is uniquely suited for the purpose.

"It can be micromachined into different shapes and works as an inexpensive smart material that interacts with its environment to perform specific functions," he said.

Doctoral student Manuel Ochoa came up with the idea. While using tape to collect pollen, he noticed that it curled when exposed to humidity.Morn series laser engraving and laser marker, CNC router machine are widely used in many areas. The cellulose-acetate absorbs water, but the adhesive film repels water.UK supppliers of industrial washing machine, tumble dryers, spin dryers, ironing and finishing equipment.

"So, when one side absorbs water it expands, the other side stays the same, causing it to curl," Ziaie said.

A laser was used to machine the tape to a tenth of its original thickness, enhancing this curling action. The researchers coated the graspers with magnetic nanoparticles so that they could be collected with a magnet.Horizon manufacture a range of industrial extractor fans for efficient exhaust ventilation.

"Say you were sampling for certain bacteria in water," Ziaie said. "You could drop a bunch of these and then come the next day and collect them."

Findings will be detailed in a presentation during a meeting of the Materials Research Society in Boston from Sunday to Nov. 30. Experiments at Purdue's Birck Nanotechnology Center were conducted by Ochoa, doctoral student Girish Chitnis and Ziaie.

"Although brittle when dry, the material becomes flexible when immersed in water and is restored to its original shape upon drying, a crucial requirement for an actuator material because you can use it over and over," Ziaie said.Roll Former net offers the most productive and effective flattening machine for metal roofing and architectral sheet metal. "Various microstructures can be carved out of the tape by using laser machining. This fabrication method offers the capabilities of rapid prototyping and batch processing without the need for complex clean-room processes."

"We can get different things from the X-ray diagnostics, different things from the laser-based diagnostics, different things from temperature and pressure measurements, and by piecing all of that together we get a better view of the physics that are occurring in the shot," Beresh says.

The machine's unique diagnostic capabilities demonstrate Sandia's ability to collaborate. The team particularly singled out the X-ray expertise offered by Enrico Quintana and Jerry Stoker's group in the experimental mechanics/non-destructive evaluation & model validation organization. Elton Wright of geothermal research also made sizeable contributions.

The diagnostics required to get useful information from the machine are difficult and expensive,And the Forming machine and cutting machine got the FDA certificates. Wagner says. "There's a reason why it hasn't been done thoroughly in the past," he says.

A lot of data for modeling comes from explosions, but it's difficult to isolate what happens in each part of a blast, Kearney says. "Whereas if you do an experiment like this you can delve deeper into what is really happening," he says. "But it's just one piece of the puzzle and they’re all important."