Epoxy resin-inspired reconfigurable supramolecular networks

With the goal to push the mechanical properties of reconfigurable supra­mo­le­cu­lar polymers towards those of thermo­set resins, we prepared and in­ves­ti­ga­ted a new family of hydrogen-bonded polymer net­works that are assemb­led from isophthalic acid-terminated oligo(bis­phe­­nol A-co-epi­chloro­hydrin) and different bipyri­dines. These materials display high sto­rage moduli of up to 3.9 GPa, can be dis­assemb­led upon heating to form melts with a viscosity of as low as 2.1 Pa·s, and fully reassemble upon cooling. We show that the new poly­mers can readily be reconfigured, re-processed or recycled and that the reversible (dis) assembly makes them useful as hot-melt adhesives that permit debonding on-demand.