Exploring AIE luminogens as stickers to construct self-healing ionomers and as probes to detect the microscopic healing dynamics

Abstract

In spite of considerable progress in self-healing polymers, detecting the healing kinetics and its underlying molecular mechanism is still in the early development stage. Herein, we design a self-healing ionomer by grafting AIEgens (PyTPE) as sticky groups onto a bromo-matrix (PBMB). The ionomer shows good mechanical properties (15 MPa, 300%) and crack healing efficiency at room temperature. Interestingly, the grafted AIEgen stickers enable us to quantify the healing kinetics and its underlying microscopic structural change through the evolution of fluorescence intensity induced by the AIE effect. In addition, a 2D correlation analysis indicates that the decoupled ionic moieties move first to recombine again during the healing process, finally leading to the reconstruction of a transient network and macro-healing. Therefore, this work offers a fluorescence-based method to study the microscopic self-healing mechanism of ionomers during damage and healing processes.