The underlying chemistry of self-healing materials

Over the past ten years, a broad range of self-healing materials, systems that can detect when they have been damaged and heal themselves either spontaneously or with the aid of a stimulus, has emerged. Although many unique compositions and components are used to create these materials, they all employ basic chemical reactions to facilitate repair processes. Kinetically controlled ring-opening reactions and reversible metal-ligand interactions have proven useful in autonomic self-healing materials, which require no stimulus (other than the formation of damage) for operation. In contrast, nonautonomic self-healing materials, which require some type of externally applied stimulus (such as heat or light) to enable healing functions, have capitalized on chemistries that utilize either reversible covalent bonds or various types of noncovalent interactions. This review describes the underlying chemistries used in state-of-the-art self-healing materials, as well as those currently in development.