Fabrication Of Mini-motor And Its Application On Energy Conversion

Natural biomolecular motors can harvest the chemical energy from the hydrolysis of adenosine triphosphate(ATP)and then convert it to the required mechanical motion to complete complex tasks,such as the transportation of organelle and vesicle.Inspired from biomolecular motors,researchers have designed and fabricated artificial motors that range from nanometer to centimeter in size,which can convert various energy to individual locomotion and carry out important tasks,such as cargo transportation,drug delivery,environmental remediation,self-assembly,and so on.In particular,converting the obtained kinetic energy from the motion of artificial motors to electric energy have raised wide attention recently.However,poor durability,low output power and energy conversion efficiency,are being faced with for the mini-generators based on the locomotion,which limit the development of mini-generators in practical application.Herein,in this thesis,to address the problem of durability of mini-motor,we propose to employ non-oxidizing gas to drive the motion of device.Besides,through optimizing the design of the smart device,not only the durability of mini-generator was improved,but both the output power and energy conversion efficiency were also increased with two orders of magnitude.In addition,to realize the harvesting of trace amount of energy,we have designed and fabricated a blood pressure-responsive movable device,realizing the energy conversion from blood pressure to mechanical energy and then to electric energy,which provides a novel strategy for the sustainable power supply for implantable medical devices.Fabrication of "half man and half machine,motor represents the revolutionary progress in the research field of artificial motor.We tried to integrate cardiomyocytes with patterned artificial substrate into a system and fabricated a biohybrid motor.The locomotion of the hybrid motor driven by the contraction of cardiomyocytes was explored.The main missions are drawn as follows:1.The utilization of hydrogen peroxide induced the destruction of artificial devices because the main driving force comes from the decomposition of hydrogen peroxide catalyzed by platinum to release oxygen bubbles,and the generated highly reactive intermediate during the decomposition process carried out a destruction on the device surface,reducing the lifetime of the mini-motor.To address this problem,we have proposed to employ the non-oxidizing gas to drive the motion of smart device,improving the durability of the smart device.Furthermore,to increase the output power and energy conversion efficiency of mini-generator,we optimized the design of smart device through introducing superhydrophobic surface.As a result,not only the durability of mini-generator was improved,but both the output power and energy conversion efficiency were also three hundred times higher than the currently reported results and can be applied to power light-emitting diodes without amplification.2.To address the problem that most mini-generators normally consume high-grade useful energy to produce low electric energy,we have designed and fabricated a blood pressure-responsive movable device,which can harvest weak energy from blood pressure.Upon systolic/diastolic blood pressure,the density of the device varied,which resulted in repeated diving/surfacing processes through the expansion and contraction of the bubble loaded inside the device.By further applying the electromagnetic induction law,electric energy was obtained from bioenergy through mechanical form,as well as a high conversion efficiency,resulting in intracorporeal self-electricity generation.The proposed methodology of mini-generators driven by blood pressure differences may provide a novel strategy for a sustainable power supply for implantable devices.3.To fabricate biocompatible movable device,a“half man and half machine,motor(biohybrid motor)was designed through integrating cardiomyocytes with patterned PDMS film.The obtained biohybrid motor could perform a swimming locomotion driven by the contraction of cardiomyocytes,which provides an idea for the fabrication of biocompatible mini-generator.