Shellfish-Inspired Sticky Adhesive May Repair Ships and Heal Wounds

Scientists are constantly taking inspiration from animals in order to create new materials. Now, they've managed to create a new adhesive inspired by the sticky proteins that mussels and barnacles excrete to allow them to cling to a hard surface--even underwater. The new glue could be used to repair ships or even help heal wounds.

The sticky substance that allows mussels to attach to underwater surfaces is made up of several proteins known as mussel foot proteins. Previously, scientists had engineered E. coli bacteria to produce individual mussel foot proteins. In this case, the researchers engineered bacteria to produce two different food proteins combined with bacterial proteins called curli fibers, which are fibrous proteins that can clump together and assemble themselves into much larger and more complex meshes.

In this case, the researchers engineered bacteria so that they would produce proteins consisted of curli fibers either bonded to mussel foot protein 3 or mussel foot protein 5. After purifying these proteins and letting them incubate and form dense, fibrous meshes, the scientists wound up with a regular yet flexible structure that bound both to wet and dry surfaces.

"The result is a powerful wet adhesive with independently functioning adsorptive and cohesive moieties," said Herbert Waite, a professor at the University of California who was not part of the research team, in a news release. "The work is very creative, rigorous and thorough."

In fact, the adhesives are stronger than naturally occurring mussel adhesives. This means that they could potentially be used for applications that range from repairing holes in ships to delicately sealing wounds. Currently, the researchers have only been able to create small amounts of this new adhesive, so they're working on improving the process to generate larger amounts.

The findings are published in the journal Nature Nanotechnology.