Collaborative Research: Developing Predictive Models for Dissipation and Actuation in Polydomain Liquid Crystal Elastomers by Bridging Scales

Liquid crystal elastomers are soft, rubber-like materials that contain special molecules called mesogens. Mesogens have unique properties that allow them to be manipulated with external forces, independently from the host polymer. Being able to directly manipulate mesogens gives rise to materials that are supersoft, can dissipate large amounts of…