Phase‐Separation‐Induced Anomalous Stiffening, Toughening, and Self‐Healing of Polyacrylamide Gels

Novel, tough, strong, and self-healable poly­acrylamide (PAAm) gels are fabricated by inducing an appropriate phase-separation structure using a poor solvent. The phase separation induces a gel–glass-like transition of the PAAm gels, providing the gels an anomalously high modulus (211 MPa), fracture stress (7.13 MPa), and fracture energy (4.16 × 104 J m−2), while keeping a high solvent content (≈60 vol%). As a service to our authors and readers,...