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Letter

Nature Materials 3, 307–310 (1 May 2004) | doi:10.1038/nmat1118

Fast liquid-crystal elastomer swims into the dark

Miguel Camacho-Lopez , Heino Finkelmann , Peter Palffy-Muhoray & Michael Shelley

Liquid-crystal elastomers (LCEs) are rubbers whose constituent molecules are orientationally ordered. Their salient feature is strong coupling between the orientational order and mechanical strain.