Recent strategies to develop self-healable crosslinked polymeric networks

Autonomous self-healable crosslinked materials designed with built-in ability to repair physical damage and cracks can prevent catastrophic failure and thus extend the lifetime of materials. They also retain their dimensional stability, mechanical strength, thermal stability, and solvent resistance. These features promote the development of effective self-healing materials for various applications. This review summarizes recent advances in the development of novel self-healable polymeric materials, both through extrinsic methods involving the encapsulation of extra healing agents in microcapsules and through intrinsic methods utilizing the formation of reversible chemical or physical crosslinks. Further, the outlook is briefly discussed on the important aspects for the current and future development of self-healable materials.