How many times did you get angry or even worse, take your
car to the garage for expensive repairs caused by potholes? The answer is most
probably: too many times. The good news is that potholes could soon become a
relic of the past due to futuristic plans to produce self-healing concrete.
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| Self-healing concrete |
The development of self- healing concrete is also aimed at
improving the durability of structures and eliminating the endless traffic jams
caused by manual repairs to structures. Structures made of self-healing
concrete have an inherent healing mechanism that becomes active when a crack
appears, thus rendering manual crack repair completely obsolete.
Scientists are experimenting with various groundbreaking new
materials to find the ideal formula for to solve this issue.
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| Self- healing concrete |
PU precursors have
shown great potential
For the efficient healing of cracked concrete, the use of
encapsulated PU-based precursors has already shown great potential. So far,
results have shown a good regain in mechanical behavior and liquid-tightness.
In proof-of-concept tests, glass tubes were used as encapsulation material.
However, to up-scale the technique and make it compatible with conventional
concrete production and placing methods, polymeric spherical microcapsules
would be more suitable. Therefore, research is ongoing to optimize the
encapsulation technique. Moreover, PU-based precursors are adapted to increase
the resistance of the healing agents to cyclic loading, so that also the
healing of dynamic cracks can be considered.
Using sunlight to fix
concrete cracks
Researchers have demonstrated a sunlight-induced,
self-healing protective coating designed to fix cracks on the surface of
concrete structures before they grow into larger ones that compromise
structural integrity.
The new coating contains polymer microcapsules, filled with
a solution that, when exposed to light, turns into a water-resistant solid. The
idea is that damage to a coated concrete surface would cause the capsules to
break open and release the solution, which then would fill the crack and
solidify in sunlight.
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| Biomerization |
Bacteria as healing
agent
Also bacteria can be used as healing agent. Scientists are experimenting with the
groundbreaking new material, which uses special bacteria to plug gaps and
cracks opened up by bad weather.
Researchers at the University of Bath, Cardiff University
and the University of Cambridge created the concrete blend, which is full of
bacteria hidden in tiny capsules. As soon as water seeps into a crack, the
bacteria quickly burst out their cases and produce limestone, sealing the gap
up before it can widen and become a pothole.
Lower CO2 emissions
and 50% lower costs
The scientists believe the technique could vastly increase
the life of concrete, remove the need for repairs, and reduce costs by up to
50%.
Carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere would be lower
because there would be no need to constantly replace roads. More than 7% of the
world’s CO2 emissions are due to cement production.
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