Pop-Up Conducting Large-Area Biographene Kirigami

ACS Nano. 2018 Oct 23;12(10):9714-9720. doi: 10.1021/acsnano.8b04507. Epub 2018 Aug 31.

Abstract

We demonstrate the rapid, large-area transformation of bioenabled graphene laminates into multidimensional geometries for pop-up and stretchable applications. Water-vapor annealing facilitates the controlled plasticization of the multilayered silk-graphene morphologies, allowing highly localized kirigami cuts by programmable drag knife with diverse type and depth of cuts. By adjusting drag-knife depth, we can generate a microscale array of full and partial cuts, enabling a purely topological approach toward the control of metastable fold-unfold states and crack fracture paths in kirigami structures. Through orthogonal control over the graphene-silk composite's nanoscale morphology, cut pattern, and semimetal-like conductivity, we showcase bioenabled laminates as a platform for prospective soft and shape-transforming electronics as flexible interconnects and stretchable energy harvesters.

Keywords: energy harvester and nanogenerator; flexible bionanocomposites; graphene oxide films; silk fibroin; soft kirigamis.