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Polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) is a commonly used silicone elastomer with broad applications. Particularly for bioengineering use, PDMS is treated with oxygen plasma with which its surface is oxidized to allow positive interaction with water and live cells. In exchange for the acquisition of hydrophilicity, the oxidized PDMS becomes mechanically brittle so that resulting formation of cracks affects the system in various ways. However, tensile strength (TS), which is an inherent capacity of a material to withstand tensile loads before breaking and is thus a key parameter limiting the use of the material, remains unclear regarding oxidized PDMS. Here we determine the TS of oxide layers created on the surface of PDMS based on micro-stretch experiments using a custom-made device. We show that the surface layer displays cracks upon tensile loading of small strains of within 10% to have a TS of ~10–100 kPa, which is approximately two orders of magnitude lower than that of unmodified PDMS. We further show that the TS sharply decreases with oxidation duration to become highly brittle, while the thickness of the resulting oxide layer finally reaches a plateau even with prolonged plasma treatment. Consequently, we suggest that gradual surface modification of PDMS takes place only within a finite region even with prolonged plasma treatment, as distinct from previously held assumptions. These quantitative data provide critical design information for the oxide layer of plasma-hydrophilized PDMS.

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