Development of three-dimensional printing system for magnetic elastomer with control of magnetic anisotropy in the structure

In this paper, we report on a new system of three-dimensional (3D) printing for a magnetic elastomer that contains magnetic particles. Not only can we fabricate a three-dimensional structure, but we can also control the magnetically anisotropic property of each position in the structure using the present technique. Our new system employed photocurable poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS) as the base material so that a method similar to a conventional 3D printing process with photolithography can be used. A magnetic powder was mixed with photocurable PDMS, and particle chain clusters were obtained by applying a magnetic field during the curing process. These chain clusters provide an anisotropic property in each part of the printed structure. We show some results of preliminary experiments and 3D printed samples in this paper. If the fabricated structure was placed under an applied magnetic field, each chain cluster will cause the rotational moment to be along the magnetic flux line, which can deform a soft matrix body. This deformation can be used as a magnetic actuator for the structure. Variable deformable structures could be developed using the present method.