Fig. 1: Preparation of the cholesteric liquid crystal elastomer sheath–core (CLCE-SC) fibres.
From: Ultra tough and high resilience mechanochromic fibres for real world stress detection
a Schematic of the shear-coating method and molecular-level orientation changes (I–IV) during the coating process. b Schematic of a CLCE-SC fibre. c Rheological analysis to determine the isotropic-cholesteric transition temperature (TIC) of the CLCE precursor. d, e, f Polarised optical microscopy (POM) images (top) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) images (bottom) of a CLCE sheath prepared at different coating temperatures. The scale bars are 500 μm. g Cross-sectional SEM images of a CLCE-SC fibre (left) and the enlarged cross-section (right) showing helical pitch (p) = 613 nm. The scale bars are 200 μm (left) and 1 μm (right). h Schematic of the cholesteric structures and colour variation with pitches. i Photographs of the mechanochromism of the CLCE-SC fibres under different loads: 200 g, 500 g, and 1 kg.
