Conditional repair by locally switching the thermal healing capability of dynamic covalent polymers with light

Anne Fuhrmann, Robert Göstl, Robert Wendt, Julia Kötteritzsch, Martin D. Hager, Ulrich S. Schubert, Kerstin Brademann-Jock, Andreas F. Thünemann, Ulrich Nöchel, Marc Behl and Stefan Hecht ()
Additional contact information
Anne Fuhrmann: Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Robert Göstl: Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Robert Wendt: Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Julia Kötteritzsch: Laboratory of Organic and Macromolecular Chemistry (IOMC), Friedrich Schiller University Jena
Martin D. Hager: Laboratory of Organic and Macromolecular Chemistry (IOMC), Friedrich Schiller University Jena
Ulrich S. Schubert: Laboratory of Organic and Macromolecular Chemistry (IOMC), Friedrich Schiller University Jena
Kerstin Brademann-Jock: Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing
Andreas F. Thünemann: Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing
Ulrich Nöchel: Institute of Biomaterial Science and Berlin-Brandenburg Center for Regenerative Therapies (BCRT), Helmholtz-Zentrum Geesthacht
Marc Behl: Institute of Biomaterial Science and Berlin-Brandenburg Center for Regenerative Therapies (BCRT), Helmholtz-Zentrum Geesthacht
Stefan Hecht: Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin

Nature Communications, 2016, vol. 7, issue 1, 1-7

Abstract: Abstract Healable materials could play an important role in reducing the environmental footprint of our modern technological society through extending the life cycles of consumer products and constructions. However, as most healing processes are carried out by heat alone, the ability to heal damage generally kills the parent material’s thermal and mechanical properties. Here we present a dynamic covalent polymer network whose thermal healing ability can be switched ‘on’ and ‘off’ on demand by light, thereby providing local control over repair while retaining the advantageous macroscopic properties of static polymer networks. We employ a photoswitchable furan-based crosslinker, which reacts with short and mobile maleimide-substituted poly(lauryl methacrylate) chains forming strong covalent bonds while simultaneously allowing the reversible, spatiotemporally resolved control over thermally induced de- and re-crosslinking. We reason that our system can be adapted to more complex materials and has the potential to impact applications in responsive coatings, photolithography and microfabrication.

Date: 2016
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms13623 Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:7:y:2016:i:1:d:10.1038_ncomms13623

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/ncomms13623

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().