Self-Healing Stretchable Wires for Reconfigurable Circuit Wiring and 3D Microfluidics

Etienne Palleau¹, Stephen Reece¹, Sharvil C. Desai¹, Michael E. Smith², Michael D. Dickey^1,*

 

This article describes the fabrication of self-healing stretchable wires formed by embedding liquid metal wires in microchannels composed of self-healing polymer. These stretchable wires can be completely severed with scissors and rapidly self-heal both mechanically and electrically at ambient conditions. By cutting the channels strategically, the pieces can be re-assembled in a different order to form complex microfluidic networks in 2D or 3D space.