Facile one-pot synthesis and self-healing properties of tetrazole-based metallopolymers in the presence of iron salts

Abstract

As promising intelligent materials, self-healing materials have the capability of healing or repairing inflicted damage. Simply, inexpensive and commercial synthetic process is one of the hard issues. By using a facile one-pot two-step methodology, polyacrylonitrile-r-poly(butyl acrylate) (PAN-r-PnBA) was successfully prepared and modified to Fe3+/tetrazole-based metallopolymers (MPs) with significant self-healing properties. FeCl3·6H2O was used as a catalyst to modify cyano groups with sodium azide (NaN3) and generate tetrazole group for coordinating with FeCl3·6H2O itself. The results indicated that the prepared MPs without any stimulus, can rapidly and autonomously heal inflicted damageat ambient temperature. These self-healing materials which were rapidly prepared with commercial and inexpensive substrates could facilitate the potential for application in a wide range.