Pixelated Camouflage from Cholesteric Liquid Crystalline Elastomers

In nature, there are full of creatures that will dynamically change their shapes and appearances to closely match their respective environments for camouflage, signaling, or energy regulation. Reflective structural colors can greatly enhance the appearance of their skin patterns, which are largely controlled by pigmented chromatophores. Meanwhile, bioorganisms are often sensitive to polarized light for navigation or communication. Cholesteric liquid crystalline elastomers (CLCEs) can assemble liquid crystal molecules into a helix, forming a 1D photonic crystal that can reversibly change the reflected colors upon mechanical deformation. Here, we demonstrate pneumatic inflation of the thin CLCE membranes with pixelated channels to achieve broadband color shift from near-infrared to ultraviolet wavelengths, where each channel is individually programmed as a color “pixel”. We also 3D print CLCE filaments as color-changing smart wearables.