Room-temperature self-healing polyurethane elastomers with high strength and superior self-healing efficiency based on aromatic disulfide-induced

Polymers are inevitably subject to mechanical damages during molding, processing, and application. Self-healing of internal and surface damage in polymers can be achieved by endowing the materials with room-temperature self-healing functions. This improvement significantly eliminates safety risks caused by material damage, enhances the safety, stability, and service life of polymer materials, facilitates the realization of sustainable resource development, and aligns with the concept of "low carbon". Room-temperature self-healing materials mainly rely on motility of molecular chain segments and dynamical equilibration of forces acting within the system. However, there have been few reports of polyurethane elastomers with high strength and high self-healing efficiency. In this paper, PUIPBD polyurethane elastomers were prepared by the chemical reacting of polytetrahydrofurandiol PTMEG-2000, isophorone diisocyanate IPDI, 1,4-butanediol (BDO) with 4,4′-dihydroxydiphenyl disulfide (DHDDS) as monomers. It was found that the self-healing efficiency of the synthesized polyurethane elastomer series was very high after 48 h of self-healing at 25 °C, all of which exceeded 79 %, and the tensile strength, elongation and fracture toughness of best performing elastomer PU90/10 could reach 89.8 %, 99.9 %, and 95.6 %, respectively after 48 h of self-heal at room temperature, showing good simultaneous room temperature self-healing efficiency.