Smart materials stimulated by chemical or by logical signals hold promise for many applications, including new sensors and actuators for medicine, environmental and process control. In contrast to other books on responsive materials which are restricted to sensing, this volume not only highlights fundamental chemical and physical principles but also focuses on the use of smart materials for applications such as drug delivery, wound healing, cell adhesion, tuneable vesicles, surface control, smart paints and glasses, separations, oil recovery and artificial muscles. In this completely updated and expanded edition, readers are introduced to the area with chapters reflecting the enormous expansion of the field in recent years. Different responsive material systems will be covered including hydrogels, membranes, thin layers, polymer brushes, chemomechanical and imprinted polymers, nanomaterials and silica particles. With contributions from internationally recognised experts, the book will appeal to graduate students and researchers in academia, healthcare and industry interested in functional materials and their applications.

Chemoresponsive Materials: Introduction, Overview, Promises;Chemomechanical Materials: Sensors and Actuators;Multi-stimuli Responsive Materials;Responsive Materials from the Self-assembly of Low Molecular Weight Gelators;Applications of Stimuli-responsive Functional Colloids;Responsive Layer-by-layer Films;Target Molecule-responsive Hydrogels;Polysaccharide-based Smart Materials;Cyclodextrin-based Chemo- and pH-responsive Polymer Systems for Pharmaceutical and Biomedical Applications;Responsive Peptide-based Materials: Stimulation by Chemical and Biological Signals;Responsive Membranes;Polymer Brushes with Chemical Responses;Chemoresponsive Mesoporous Silica Nanoparticles for Targeted Drug Delivery in Cancer Therapy;Chemoresponsive Molecularly Imprinted Polymers Chemo-responsive Self-motion by an Interplay of Micro- and Macroscopic Dynamics;Piezelectric Chemosensors and Multisensory Systems;Mechanoresponsive Functional Polymer Materials