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PI: Xuanhe Zhao, PhD (CV, ResearchID, Google Scholar)  

Welcome to the Soft Active Materials Laboratory at Duke University (Duke SAMs Lab)!

We are a diverse group of people with backgrounds in solid mechanics, materials, applied mathematics, and biomedical engineering. Our research is motivated by new materials and phenomena emerging on the interface between engineering and biology. We are currently particularly interested in soft materials which are easily deformed by multiple thermodynamic forces (e.g. stress, electric field, magnetic field, and chemical potential) and their applications in various technologies such as energy storage, energy harvesting, biofouling, drug delivery, tissue engineering, robotics, microfluidics, and water treatment. Examples of our recent works include:

• Control reversible crumpling and unfolding of large-area graphene sheets (Coming soon).

• Invent Dynamic Electrostatic Lithography for on-demand multiscale patterning on large-area curved surface (paper, MRS Materials 360, BBC Focus Magzine)

• Enhance electrical energy density of dielectric polymers with mechanical constraints (paper).

• Discover electro-creasing to cratering instability, a failure mode for dielectric polymers and gels widely used in cables and electronic devices for insulation and energy storage (paper, video, Science Daily report).

• Develop a constitutive model of interpenetrating polymer networks with damage (paper).

• Invent magnetic macroporous gel for on-demand deliveries of drugs and cells (paper, Nature highlight, Nature Materials highlight, PNAS highlight).

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