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A facile method to prepare UV light-triggered self-healing polyphosphazenes

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Abstract

It is of importance to prepare self-healing materials using reversible covalent bonding within polymers. In this work, we introduced ethyl 4-aminocinnamate (EA) to polyphosphazenes to prepare a novel self-healing elastomer via the reversible photochemical [2+2] cycloaddition. Linear polymer, poly[(n-butylamino) x (ethyl 4-aminocinnamate) y ] phosphazene, was synthesized firstly via the ring-opening polymerization, and then substitution reaction was conducted to introduce EA as side groups. Consequently, the damaged polyphosphazenes were re-healed by being exposed to UV light. Their structures were characterized by 1H-NMR, 31P-NMR, FTIR, and GPC; thermal properties were tested by TGA and DMA. The [2+2] cycloaddition reaction and retro-[2+2] cycloaddition were investigated by UV–vis. The results showed that the broken polyphosphazenes could be self-healed by the UV light irradiation at 365 nm. The damaged polyphasphozene could be re-healed almost completely within about half an hour.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the financial support of NSFC (41240026) and Scientific Research Foundation for the New employees of Southwest University (SWU114110).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Textiles and Garments, Southwest University, Chongqing, 400715, People’s Republic of China

    Lei Hu & Xinjian Cheng

  2. School of Chemistry and Materials Science, South-Central University for Nationalities, Wuhan, 430074, People’s Republic of China

    Lei Hu, Xinjian Cheng & Aiqing Zhang

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  1. Lei Hu
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  2. Xinjian Cheng
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  3. Aiqing Zhang
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Correspondence to Xinjian Cheng.

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Xinjian Cheng is the joint first author.

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Hu, L., Cheng, X. & Zhang, A. A facile method to prepare UV light-triggered self-healing polyphosphazenes. J Mater Sci 50, 2239–2246 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10853-014-8786-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10853-014-8786-y

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