Superstretchable, yet stiff, fatigue-resistant ligament-like elastomers.

Abstract

Ligaments are flexible and stiff tissues around joints to support body movements, showing superior toughness and fatigue-resistance. Such a combination of mechanical properties is rarely seen in synthetic elastomers because stretchability, stiffness, toughness, and fatigue resistance are seemingly incompatible in materials design. Here we resolve this long-standing mismatch through a hierarchical crosslinking design. The obtained elastomer can endure 30,000% stretch and exhibit a Young's modulus of 18 MPa and toughness of 228 MJ m^-3, outperforming all the reported synthetic elastomers. Furthermore, the fatigue threshold is as high as 2,682 J m^-2, the same order of magnitude as the ligaments (~1,000 J m^-2). We reveal that the dynamic double-crosslinking network composed of Li⁺-O interactions and PMMA nanoaggregates allows for a hierarchical energy dissipation, enabling the elastomers as artificial ligaments in soft robotics.