Perylene as an electron-rich moiety in healable, complementary π-π stacked, supramolecular polymer systems

A two-component, supramolecular polymer blend has been designed using a novel pi-electron rich bisperylene-terminated polyether. This polymer is able to self-assemble through electronically complementary pi-pi stacking interactions with a pi-electron-deficient chain-folding polydiimide to afford thermally healable polymer blends. Model compounds were developed to assess the suitability of the deep green complexes formed between perylene residues and chain-folding bis-diimides for use in polymer blends. The polymer blends thus synthesised were elastomeric in nature and demonstrated healable properties as demonstrated by scanning electron microscopy. Healing was observed to occur rapidly at ca. 75 degrees C, and excellent healing efficiencies were found by tensometric and rheometric analyses. These tuneable, stimuli-responsive, supramolecular polymer blends are compared to related healable blends featuring pyrene-terminated oligomers. (C) 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.