Benzoxazine resins as smart materials and future perspectives

Polybenzoxazines are high-performance thermosets having a range of properties and capability to overcome drawbacks of traditional resole- and novolac-type phenolics. They exhibit low water absorption, high T_g, high char yield, flame resistance, low shrinkage, and also limited or no release of by-products during curing, and they have comparable mechanical performance with bismaleimide resins. In this chapter, we provide an overview of polybenzoxazines highlighting in the progress in the synthesis of both benzoxazine monomers and polybenzoxazine prepolymers, their resulting materials, and their composites. Moreover, industrially important benzoxazines and current advances of benzoxazine applications as smart materials ranging from self-healing materials to electroactive coatings were reviewed.