The effect of electron density in furan pendant group on thermal-reversible Diels–Alder reaction based self-healing properties of polymethacrylate derivatives

Herein, we discuss the effect of electron density in a furan pendant group on the thermally reversible Diels–Alder (DA) reaction based self-healing efficiency in polymethacrylate derivatives. First, the furan-functionalized polymethacrylates (rPFMA and dPFMA) having different electron density in the furan pendant groups were prepared through free-radical polymerization. The healing efficiency of rPFMA, which was expected to have high healing efficiency due to the high reactivity of DA reaction originating from the electron density in the furan moiety, was shown to be 95.89% in the first and 69.86% in the second healing process, respectively, where it is higher than that of dPFMA having relatively low electron density in the furan moiety. To illustrate these results, kinetic tests of the DA reaction for rPFMA64 and dPFMA64 were performed, where the reactivity of the DA reaction for rPFMA64 was much higher than that for dPFMA64. This could be explained by the electron density in the furan pendant groups which controls the reactivity of DA reaction having a major effect on the efficiency of self-healing performance in furan-functionalized polymethacrylates.