A "self-oscillating" gel that swells and deswells periodically under constant conditions is developed as a novel biomimetic gel differing from conventional stimuli-responsive polymer gels. By utilizing the peristaltic motion of the self-oscillating gel, autonomous mass-transport systems can be realized. With the propagation of the chemical wave, the loaded gel cargo is autonomously transported by rotating on the surface. To apply the self-driven gel conveyer to a wider range of uses, it is important to investigate the influence of the physical interaction between the self-oscillating gel and the loaded cargo on its transporting ability. Here, the effect of the interaction is evaluated by using several kinds of gel cargo with varying charge states, hydrophilicities, and surface roughnesses.

Novel conveyer gels exhibiting autonomous peristaltic motion without external stimuli were prepared by copolymerizing temperature-responsive N-isopropylacrylamide (NIPAAm), ruthenium tris(2,2'-bipyridine) (Ru(bpy) 3 ) as the catalyst for the BelousovZhabotinsky (BZ) reaction and 2-acrylamido-2-methylpropanesulfonic acid (AMPS). The prepared bulky gel had an aggregative structure of its microgels when the AMPS feed ratio was low due to the effect of the poor solvent in the polymerization process. That structure highly improved the swellingdeswelling kinetics and generated swellingdeswelling amplitude more than 10% of the gel thickness, which was approximately 10 times larger than that of the gel with a homogeneous network structure. Further, we attempted to transport an object by utilizing the peristaltic motion of poly(NIPAAm-co-Ru(bpy) 3 -co-AMPS) gel. A cylindrical poly(acrylamide) (PAAm) gel was transported as a model object on the poly(NIPAAm-co-Ru(bpy) 3 -co-AMPS) gel surface wave when the gel had the aggregative structure of its microgels.