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Digitally tunable physicochemical coding of material composition and topography in continuous microfibres.
- Source :
- Nature Materials; Nov2011, Vol. 10 Issue 11, p877-883, 7p, 5 Diagrams
- Publication Year :
- 2011
-
Abstract
- Heterotypic functional materials with compositional and topographical properties that vary spatiotemporally on the micro- or nanoscale are common in nature. However, fabricating such complex materials in the laboratory remains challenging. Here we describe a method to continuously create microfibres with tunable morphological, structural and chemical features using a microfluidic system consisting of a digital, programmable flow control that mimics the silk-spinning process of spiders. With this method we fabricated hydrogel microfibres coded with varying chemical composition and topography along the fibre, including gas micro-bubbles as well as nanoporous spindle-knots and joints that enabled directional water collection. We also explored the potential use of the coded microfibres for tissue engineering applications by creating multifunctional microfibres with a spatially controlled co-culture of encapsulated cells. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 14761122
- Volume :
- 10
- Issue :
- 11
- Database :
- Complementary Index
- Journal :
- Nature Materials
- Publication Type :
- Academic Journal
- Accession number :
- 66748193
- Full Text :
- https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat3108