Abstract
In recent years, polymer gels have been actively studied. Polymer gels are promising as functional materials, and cause a drastic volume change by external stimuli such as temperature, pH and electric field, etc. These smart gels have been applied to soft robots and micro pumps. Previously, we have studied the self-oscillating gel. Self-oscillating polymer gels generate the cyclic volume change. Self-oscillating motion of the gels is generated by the chemical energy of the Belouzov-Zhabotinsky (BZ) reaction. Normally, self-oscillating gel generate the local swelling waves. In this study, we found that the gel generated the local contraction wave under the stretched state.