Intrinsically reprocessable, self-healing elastomers

Conventional elastomers formed by solely permanent, chemical crosslinks are not reprocessable, which causes environmental burden to the society. By contrast, networks crosslinked by solely reversible, physical bonds are reprocessable and self-healable. The physical bonds, however, are much weaker than chemical crosslinks, limiting the strength of the resulted polymer networks. Here, we propose a concept that exploits the self-assembly of block copolymers integrating strong physical associations and weak reversible hydrogen bonds to create an intrinsically reprocessable, self-healing elastomer. We find that the reversible bonds promote the formation of ordered nanostructures, which, in turn, result in unique macroscopic mechanical properties. Our results provide insights on the development of intrinsically reprocessable, self-healing elastomers.