Bio-inspired reversible underwater adhesive

Yanhua Zhao, Yang Wu, Liang Wang, Manman Zhang, Xuan Chen, Minjie Liu, Jun Fan, Junqiu Liu, Feng Zhou, Zuankai Wang

Research output: Journal article publicationJournal articleAcademic researchpeer-review

412 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

The design of smart surfaces with switchable adhesive properties in a wet environment has remained a challenge in adhesion science and materials engineering. Despite intense demands in various industrial applications and exciting progress in mimicking the remarkable wet adhesion through the delicate control of catechol chemistry, polyelectrolyte complex, and supramolecular architectures, the full recapitulation of nature's dynamic function is limited. Here, we show a facile approach to synthesize bioinspired adhesive, which entails the reversible, tunable, and fast regulation of the wet adhesion on diverse surfaces. The smart wet adhesive takes advantage of the host-guest molecular interaction and the adhesive nature of catechol chemistry, as well as the responsive polymer, allowing for screening and activation of the interfacial interaction simply by a local temperature trigger in an on-demand manner. Our work opens up an avenue for the rational design of bioinspired adhesives with performances even beyond nature.

Original languageEnglish
Article number2218
JournalNature Communications
Volume8
Issue number1
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Dec 2017
Externally publishedYes

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • General Chemistry
  • General Biochemistry,Genetics and Molecular Biology
  • General
  • General Physics and Astronomy

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