Plant oil-derived vitrimers-graphene composites with self-healing ability triggered by multiple stimuli

Abstract

Bio-based polymer materials with multi-stimuli responsiveness and multichannel self-healing ability have received significant attention due to their increasing impact on intelligent device. In this study, we report a direct construction of bio-based epoxy vitrimer (EV) from green, renewable precursors including soybean oil and tung oil that could offer new opportunities for constructions of novel polymer network intrinsically containing favorable features such as multi-stimuli response and multichannel self-healing ability, repeatable processing and recycling. Epoxidized soybean oil (ESO) and tung maleic anhydride (TMA) was used to produce a full plant oil-based EV. Tensile strengths of EVs significantly increased from 1.27 MPa to 3.7 MPa, which was due to the formation of multiple H-bonds and increased crosslink density. EVs with micropores or cracks cut achieved self-healing after heating at 200 °C in oven after 60 min. A practicable strategy for fabricating full plant oil based EV composites using graphene was developed to produce multifunctional vitrimers with self-healing ability triggered by multiple stimuli. The electricity, heat, electromagnetic wave and IR light triggered self-healing of EV composite with graphene were achieved.