Self-healing Materials: A Review of Recent Developments

Self-healing polymer is a kind of functional polymer materials that can repair scratches, cracks and other mechanical damage, whose unique self-healing ability is of great significance for prolonging the life of materials. Eigen self-healing polymers have become the focus of current research due to their advantages of mild healing conditions and repeatable healing. In this paper, the preparation technology and properties of self-healing elastomers were reviewed, which provided guidance for the preparation of polymers with high repair efficiency and pointed out its future development trend. The self-healing polymer materials based on Diels-Alder reaction, metal bond, hydrogen bond, ionic bond, disulfide bond, etc ., are mainly introduced, and their preparation process, healing mechanism and healing properties are reviewed. Although much progress has been made in self-healing elastomers based on different dynamic bonds, the development of materials with high repair efficiency remains a huge challenge. In this paper, various repair pathways of self-healing elastomers were reviewed, which provided guidance for the balance between repair and mechanical properties. The development of inherently self-healing polymers was also prospected.