Self-healing Polymeric Hydrogels: Toward Multifunctional Soft Smart Materials

The concept of self-healing that involves a built-in ability to heal in response to damage wherever and whenever it occurs in a material, analogous to the healing process in living organisms, has emerged a couple of decades ago. Driven primarily by the demands for life-like materials and soft smart materials, therefore, the development of self-healing polymeric hydrogels has continually attracted the attention of the scientific community. Here, this review is intended to give an in-depth overview of the state-of-the-art advances in the field of self-healing polymeric hydrogels. Specifically, recently emerging trends in self-healing polymeric hydrogels are summarized, and notably, recommendations to endow these hydrogels with fascinating multi-functionalities including luminescence, conductivity/magnetism and shape memory etc. are presented. To close, the current challenges and future opportunities in this field are also discussed.