Chemo-mechanical actuator using self-oscillating gel for artificial cilia

A chemo-mechanical actuator using self-oscillating polymer gel has been fabricated by a moving mask deep X-ray lithography (M/sup 2/DXL) technique in combination with micro reactive molding technique. The actuator was composed of a polymer gel plate that has micro projection array (bottom diameter of 100 /spl mu/m, height of 300 /spl mu/m and pitch of 250 /spl mu/m) on the surface. The elliptical motion of the micro projection top was confirmed for the first time. The FEM analysis revealed that the lateral and vertical motion of the projection top were mainly resulted from the propagation of the swelling-deswelling deformation of the base plate.