Engineers create polymer gel composite that regenerates when damaged 11/27/2013 - 00:00 hen a chair leg breaks or a cell phone shatters, either must be repaired or replaced. But what if these materials could be programmed to regenerate-themselves, replenishing the damaged or missing components, and thereby extend their lifetime and reduce the need for costly repairs? That potential is now possible according to researchers at the University of Pittsburgh Swanson School of Engineering, who have developed computational models to design a new polymer gel that would enable complex materials to regenerate themselves. The article, “Harnessing Interfacially-Active Nanorods to Regenerate Severed Polymer Gels” (DOI: 10.1021/nl403855k), was published November 19 in the American Chemical Society journal Nano Letters.
