Self-healing
A biological organism can repair damage up to a certain degree by self healing. A transfer of this self healing strategy onto man-made materials would result in a prolonged lifetime and considerably reduced costs. For example, the worldwide yearly costs caused by corrosion are estimated to a total of 300 billion us dollars.
Over the past two decades the development of self healing for ceramics, concrete, composites and fibers was fast-paced. With a delay of five to ten years self healing strategies for polymers have emerged that build on the following principles (among others):
- Micro- and nanoencapsultion of monomers as healing agents
- Diels-Alder- and Retro-Diels-Alder-Reactions
- Ring opening methathesis polymerisation (ROMP)
- Polydimethylsiloxane based healing
- Biomimetic microvaskulary networks
- Ionomers as self healing polymers
This project is focused on a self healing mechanism through microencapsulated healing agents in coating materials.