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Self-healing properties of poly(ethylene-co-vinyl acetate)

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Abstract

Poly(ethylene-co-vinyl acetate) with 42 wt% of vinyl acetate shows autonomic self-healing at room temperature without macroscopic flow. Intermolecular diffusion of amorphous chains through the jointed boundary, which occurs because of the large amount of amorphous chains with low glass transition temperature, is responsible for the healing phenomenon. Furthermore, the healing efficiency is found to be enhanced when the separated pieces are recombined immediately after cutting. This result indicates that the cut surface has marked molecular mobility owing to the destruction of crystallites during the cutting process, which is supported by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) measurements. The marked molecular mobility at the surface is, however, observed only for a short period after cutting, because further crystallization after cutting restricts the molecular motion.

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Acknowledgments

This work was promoted by COI program “Construction of next-generation infrastructure system using innovative materials”—realization of safe and secure society that can coexist with the Earth for centuries—supported by the Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST). Further, a part of this study was supported by Grand-in-Aid for Scientific Research No. 25410221.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Materials Science, Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, 1-1 Asahidai, Nomi, Ishikawa, 923-1292, Japan

    Ryuya Osato, Takumi Sako, Jiraporn Seemork, Sunatda Arayachukiat, Shogo Nobukawa & Masayuki Yamaguchi

  2. Program in Petrochemistry, Faculty of Science, Chulalongkorn University, Pathumwan, Bangkok, 10330, Thailand

    Jiraporn Seemork & Sunatda Arayachukiat

Authors
  1. Ryuya Osato
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  2. Takumi Sako
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  3. Jiraporn Seemork
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  4. Sunatda Arayachukiat
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  5. Shogo Nobukawa
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  6. Masayuki Yamaguchi
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Masayuki Yamaguchi.

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Supplementary information 1

Schematic illustration of the sample preparation procedures for the DSC surface crystallinity evaluation measurements: (a) a large piece measuring 3 × 3 × 1.1 mm3 was cut out from the compressed sheet and kept at 25 °C for 64 h prior to the measurement, (b) 30 small pieces each with dimensions of 0.7 × 0.7 × 0.7 mm3 were cut from the compressed sheet and used immediately after cutting, and (c) the small pieces were kept at 25 °C for 64 h prior to the measurement. (GIF 90 kb)

High resolution image (TIF 82 kb)

Supplementary information 2

Schematic illustration of molecular chains after cutting (GIF 89 kb)

High resolution image (TIF 95 kb)

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Osato, R., Sako, T., Seemork, J. et al. Self-healing properties of poly(ethylene-co-vinyl acetate). Colloid Polym Sci 294, 537–543 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00396-015-3817-z

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00396-015-3817-z

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