Sensing Materials: Self-Healing Hydrogels

Abstract

Modern technologies surround future of human races. Therefore, constantly development of materials and devices as well as creation of intelligent and hybrid materials are being prioritized. This chapter aims to cover a new type of hybrid materials of which self-healing ability and analyte-responsive sensitivity are synergized into a hydrogel matrix. Synthesis of these materials is approached by two relatively independent tasks. The first task is designing self-healing chemistry for hydrogel, while the second task is inclusion of sensing and transduction elements into the self-healing hydrogels. Important, some proof-of-concept sensors using the self-healing hydrogels are communicated in this chapter.