Battlestar Galactica: Self-Repairing Materials

In a comment to Stephen's last Battlestar Galactica post, Bionic Man asked: "Is there a real-world equivalent to the Cylon bio-metal? How far along is research into self-repairing materials?" At this stage, the research into self-repair could best be described as promising — certainly promising enough to motivate several of the top materials research teams in the world to work on the project, and promising enough to inspire significant investment by major corporations like Airbus. Plus, anyone who solves the myriad problems behind self-repair is sure to be richer than Midas, maybe even richer than Bill Gates. The most mature research doesn't really involve a spray on fix-it like the one the Cylons offer so much as self-repairing capacity built right into the materials. Oh and I should clarify, while some scientists are looking at metal oxides as way to create self-repairing metal, the future of this field can be ...