Water accelerated self-healing of hydrophobic copolymers

Dmitriy Davydovich and Marek W. Urban ()
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Dmitriy Davydovich: Clemson University
Marek W. Urban: Clemson University

Nature Communications, 2020, vol. 11, issue 1, 1-7

Abstract: Abstract Previous studies have shown that copolymer compositions can significantly impact self-healing properties. This was accomplished by enhancement of van der Waals (vdW) forces which facilitate self-healing in relatively narrow copolymer compositional range. In this work we report the acceleration of self-healing in alternating/random hydrophobic acrylic-based copolymers in the presence of confined water molecules. Under these conditions competing vdW interactions do not allow H2O-diester H-bonding, thus forcing nBA side groups to adapt L-shape conformations, generating stronger dipole-dipole interactions resulting in shorter inter-chain distances compared to ‘key-and-lock’ associations without water. The perturbation of vdW forces upon mechanical damage in the presence of controllable amount of confined water is energetically unfavorable leading the enhancement of self-healing efficiency of hydrophobic copolymers by a factor of three. The concept may be applicable to other self-healing mechanisms involving reversible covalent bonding, supramolecular chemistry, or polymers with phase-separated morphologies.

Date: 2020
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DOI: 10.1038/s41467-020-19405-5

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