Low-voltage-driven, flexible and durable paraffin–polydimethylsiloxane-based composite film with switchable transparency

• The paraffin–polydimethylsiloxane-based composite film with switchable transparency is successfully fabricated.
• The composite film is flexible and can be driven by low voltages.
• The switching speed from opaque state to transparent state is fast.
• The composite film has potential applications in transparency-switchable devices.
• The fabrication method is easy to scale up for commercial productions.

Recently, transparency-switchable devices were widely used in the fields of solar control, privacy, tactical display and flexible auto windows. In this work, we successfully fabricate a new type of electrical-driven composite material with switchable transparency. The composite is a trilayer structure, composing of paraffin wax and polydimethylsiloxane composite, indium tin oxide and polyethylene terephthalate. When a DC voltage of 10 V is applied to the composite film, it shows a quick switching from opaque state to transparent state in less than 8 s. The transmittance changes from 2% to 75%. After the voltage is turned off, the composite film reverses back to opaque state. Moreover, the composite film shows a stable and reversible optical performance after 200 times cycling of opaque–transparent switching. These features indicate that this new type of composite, which possesses the properties of excellent flexibility, rapid response and durable optical switching, will be widely used in the fields including optical switches, biomimetic camouflages and so on.

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