Pile-o’-polymers breaks up on command

Many children like to stack wooden blocks into towers. Most of those kids also like busting those edifices apart.

Likewise, materials scientists have been playing with ways to stack one-molecule-thick layers of electrically charged polymers. By controlling which polymers are in what layers, the experimenters have improved the properties of prototype, plastic-based electronic components and other devices. Now, Steve Granick of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and one of his colleagues have shown that they can trigger such stacks of polymers to break apart on cue.