Facilely Prepared Reprocessable High-Performance Polyurea Ionic Conductive Elastomers Based on HUBs with Strain- and Temperature-Sensing Capability

An ionic conductive elastomer (ICE) is a novel type of ion conductive material that has emerged in recent years. Conventional ionic conductive materials such as hydrogels and solvent gels tend to exhibit poor weathering behavior due to the presence of water or solutions. Ions in ICE are migrated directly into the polymer network without solvents. In this work, a novel ICE based on polyurea (HUBTPU ILx) with a hard segment of hindered urea bonds (HUBs) is prepared. It has a three-dimensional network structure with outstanding mechanical properties. Furthermore, HUBs are introduced in the molecular structure so that the material possesses a certain reprocessing performance. This series of ICEs offer the combination of ideal properties, including the fantastic mechanical properties with the fracture strength of 4.3 MPa, the stretchability up to 1800% and high conductivity, up to 6.61 × 10–3 S/m. The applications of ICEs were demonstrated by creating a sensor that detects the movement of joints and breathing. Furthermore, it was also demonstrated that the reprocessing process had almost no effect on the sensing performance of the prepared sensors.