Local Thermal Analysis for Self-Healing polymer network structures

Research in the field of materials that are able to repair sustained damage is increasing worldwide. This is also the case for polymers and polymer-based materials, like composites and coatings. Reversible polymer network systems are one type of polymer chemistries that is able to repair a sustained damage. In this work different polymer network systems are made thermally reversible by the incorporation of dynamic covalent bonds in the polymer network structure. The reversibility is based on the Diels-Alder reaction of a furan and a maleimide [1-2]. These reversible polymer network systems can be repaired by increasing temperature.
Local thermal analysis techniques have proven themselves very useful to study the thermal properties of polymeric materials on the micro- or even nano-scale. These local techniques can be used to study the healing mechanism and healing kinetics at the microscopic scale and to compare this healing mechanism for different polymer network structures and chemistries [3]. The self-healing behavior is studied on the microscopic scale with local and surface analysis techniques. Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) and Local Thermal Analysis (LTA) techniques are used to study the thermal properties at the microscopic scale and, ultimately, to reveal the self-healing of microscopic defects.
Self-healing polymer networks structures are applied as protective coatings on metallic substrates. Nano-lithography is used to create reproducible microscopic defects with tunable size. The heating-used healing of the defects is monitored by AFM by means of an in-situ heating stage.