Automatic repair materials
A team of researchers at the University of Illinois has designed a naturally resolved synthetic material based on the tissue repair mechanism used by biological systems. Every time the crack is formed in a conventional polymeric material, the damage is supported by the entire structure. If the crack has been created at great depth, the damage suffered by the structure is greater and it is also very difficult to detect and repair this gap. In this new material, however, the damage is repaired naturally.
For this purpose it uses a “curable” agent stored in microcapsules and a special catalyst that permeates the area of the structure. With the appearance of the cleft, the microcapsules break and extend the agent they contain to the affected region. When the agent and catalyst come together a polymerization occurs and the crack closes. According to the results of the sessions, these types of materials are able to recover up to 75% of the initial resistance.
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