In this talk, I will provide an overview of our biomimetic design of modular polydomain polymers as well as self-healing polymers. Modular multi-domain architecture is commonly used in biopolymers as a molecular strategy to combine apparently orthogonal properties such as strength, toughness, and elasticity. Inspired by Nature, my laboratory has designed a series of biomimetic modular polymers with folded nano-domains as the repeat units. In the first part of this presentation, I will discuss about our biomimetic design concept, synthesis, and SMFS studies and finally structure-property correlation. In the second part of my talk, I will share our recent progress in autonomous self-healing polymer designs using both supramolecular interactions and dynamic covalent bonds. For noncovalent healing mechanism, we developed multiphase supramolecular thermoplastic elastomers that combine high modulus and toughness with spontaneous healing capability by using hydrogen-bonding and metal-ligand interactions. For using dynamic covalent interactions, my laboratory has demonstrated olefin metathesis and boronic ester exchange reactions can afford efficient self-healing polymers.

Bioinspired design of modular polymers and self-healing materials

256th National Meeting (2018)

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