## 5 Conclusions  
The presented work, took into consideration the overall behavior of the mortar-SAPs composites manufactured and examined. It also comprises the determination of their mechanical properties, their microstructure evaluation, as well as the evaluation of their self-healing behavior yielding a series of conclusions. Even though it is often reported in literature that the incorporation of SAPs in mortars causes degradation in mechanical properties and specifically in compressive strength [1; 7; 9; 10; 15; 17], within the manuscript it is shown that, the incorporation of tailored SAPs with respect to their structure (hybrid organic core--inorganic shell structure, spherical shape in the submicron scale) did not negatively influence neither the flexural nor the compressive strength of the mortars. This is directly correlated with the microstructure and porosity evaluation of the mortars, which took place via microCT analysis. In particular, the total porosity was reduced by about 0.5% and 2.5% for mortar-SAPs-1 and mortar-SAPs-2, respectively, while the range of the pore size distribution became narrower for both SAPs concentrations compared to the control specimens. As a result, these SAPs enhanced cement hydration reactions when incorporated in the mortars without introducing more stress inducing sites (macropores left behind in the matrix because of the deswelling of SAPs particles during cement curing) and consequently not compromising the mortars strength. Moreover, the Gaussian deconvolution procedure of the GSH of all the mortar specimens examined in this work, showed that the minimum unhydrated cement phases (5%) after 28 days of aging, were found in the case of mortar-SAPs-1, which also revealed the more pronounced self-healing behavior.  
Conclusively, the overall SAPs functionality in cementitious-based materials was optimized while, the SAP concentration of 1% bwoc was promoted as the premium one in reference to mortar composite strength, microstructure and self-healing enhancement.  
Conceptualization, I.A.K. ([PERSON]) and I.A.K. ([PERSON]); methodology, I.A.K. ([PERSON]); software, I.A.K. ([PERSON]) and I.A.K. ([PERSON]); validation, I.A.K. ([PERSON]), I.A.K.  
\begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{c c} \hline \hline
**Specimen** & \(h_{i}\) (\%) \\ \hline Mortar-reference & 20 \\ Mortar-SAPs-1 & 84 \\ Mortar-SAPs-2 & 31 \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular}
\end{table}
Table 5: Indexes \(h_{i}\) for the mortar/SAPs specimens and control specimens.  
([PERSON]) and C.A.C.; formal analysis, I.A.K. ([PERSON]) and I.A.K. ([PERSON]); investigation, I.A.K. ([PERSON]); resources, I.A.K. ([PERSON]) and I.A.K. ([PERSON]); data curation, I.A.K. ([PERSON]); writing--original draft preparation, I.A.K. ([PERSON]) and I.A.K. ([PERSON]); writing--review and editing, I.A.K. ([PERSON]) and C.A.C.; visualization, I.A.K. ([PERSON]) and I.A.K. ([PERSON]); supervision, C.A.C.; project administration, C.A.C.; funding acquisition, C.A.C. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.  
These results are part of the projects that have received funding from the European Union's HORIZON 2020 research and innovation program under grant agreement no. 685445 (LORCENIS) and under grant agreement no. 814505 (DECOAT).  
Data sharing not applicable.  
The authors declare no conflict of interest.