Biological tissues can accurately differentiate external mechanical stresses and actively select suitable strategies (e.g., reversible strain-stiffening, self-healing) to sustain or restore their integrity and related functionalities as required. Synthetic materials… Click to show full abstract
Biological tissues can accurately differentiate external mechanical stresses and actively select suitable strategies (e.g., reversible strain-stiffening, self-healing) to sustain or restore their integrity and related functionalities as required. Synthetic materials that can imitate the characteristics of biological tissues have a wide range of engineering and bioengineering applications. However, no success has been demonstrated to realize such strain-stiffening behavior in synthetic networks, particularly using flexible polymers, which has remained a great challenge. Here, we present one such synthetic hydrogel material prepared from two flexible polymers (polyethylene glycol and branched polyethylenimine) that exhibits both strain-stiffening and self-healing capabilities. The developed synthetic hydrogel network not only mimics the main features of biological mechanically responsive systems but also autonomously self-heals after becoming damaged, thereby recovering its full capacity to perform its normal physiological functions.
               
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