Electroresponsive Structurally Colored Materials: A Combination of Structural and Electrochromic Effects

Abstract

Electroresponsive structurally colored materials composed of ordered arrays of polyaniline@poly(methyl methacrylate) (PANI@PMMA) core-shell nanoparticles have been successfully prepared. The core-shell nanoparticles were synthesized by deposition of PANI shells on the surfaces of the PMMA cores by the oxidative polymerization of anilinium chloride. Ordered arrays were then fabricated by using the fluidic cell method. Because the ordered arrays and the PANI shells generate structural and electrochromic colors, respectively, these core-shell colloidal crystals exhibited colors resulting from the combined effects of these materials. The crystal colors depended greatly on the size of PANI@PMMA particles and could also be varied by the application of a voltage. The electrochromic colors of these arrays were found to be quite different from those exhibited by pure PANI films prepared by electrochemical oxidation.

WO3‐Based Electrochromic Distributed Bragg Reflector: Toward Electrically Tunable Microcavity Luminescent Device

“…In this regard, redox‐active polymers, polyelectrolyte hydrogels, liquid crystals, or electrochromic materials have been introduced into the periodic structure for realizing electrically tuned optical coatings. The shape and size manipulation using redox‐active polymers, polyelectrolyte hydrogel, and liquid crystal usually cause large reflectance shifts, but slow response and poor durability, unsuitable for practical applications.…”

Fundamentals and Applications of Chalcogenide Phase‐Change Material Photonics

“…In this regard, functional materials with either electrically or optically tunable parameters are technologically important and desirable. Over the past few years, more modern materials with tunable optical properties, such as liquid crystals, graphene, electrochromic, vanadium dioxide (VO 2 ), and chalcogenide PCMs have shown promising potentials for controlling the light propagation in nanostructures while maintaining the structures’ geometries. The actively tunable photonic devices certainly exhibit the exceptional advantages of easier manufacturing and cheaper cost over the passively tunable devices that either tune the optical responses by varying the measurement setup or the geometry of the structure .…”

Large-scale preparation of size-controlled Fe3O4@SiO2 particles for electrophoretic display with non-iridescent structural colors

“…The common EPD materials use organic particles with easy preparation, good monodispersity, and low refractive index, such as PS 7 and PMMA. 8 These spherical particles are limited by their low color visibility and iridescent color. Inorganic composite particles with high refractive indexes, such as Se@Ag 2 Se, 9 ZnS, 10 and TiO 2 , 11 were employed to obtain bright structural colors.…”