Preparation of a Poly(vinyl alcohol)-Based Hydrogel Fiber with Excellent Mechanical and Shape Memory Performances with the Help of the Fiber Drawing Technology

As a kind of intelligent soft material, shape memory poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) hydrogels have been paid plenty of attention. Based on a unique characteristic, a shape memory PVA hydrogel fiber is expected to greatly open up an application area. However, the application scope for regular PVA hydrogels is severely limited by their poor mechanical properties and inadequate shape memory performance. Herein, a PVA-based hydrogel fiber containing tea polyphenols (TPs) possessing excellent mechanical and shape memory performances was prepared with the help of the fiber drawing technology. The hydrogel fiber in whatever various temporary shapes can recover to the original shapes in 2–5 s. Meanwhile, thanks to drawing, the strength of the PVA/TP hydrogel fiber is greatly improved, but the elongation at break can still be maintained at a high level. Taking the advantage of the outstanding performance, the hydrogel fiber used in suture displays very satisfactory results in terms of suture speed and reliability. Therefore, it is believed that such drawn shape memory hydrogel fibers are promising materials in the application of advanced biomedical textiles and intelligent engineering fibers.