Batteries are typically held together by chemicals that don’t easily degrade. However, some marine animals have evolved remarkable natural ways to attach themselves to wet, slippery surfaces.
Articles on Natural adhesives
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The glue that gives spider webs their stickiness is a form of spider silk protein. Researchers can imagine cool uses for a synthetic version – but had to wait for the tricky glue gene to be sequenced.
How do a frog’s tongue and saliva work together to be sticky enough to lift 1.4 times the animal’s body weight? Painstaking lab work found their spit switches between two distinct phases to nab prey.
Nature has created some of the strongest glues with properties we could use – if we understood how they worked.
Top contributors
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PhD Student in Biomechanics, Georgia Institute of Technology
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Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Biology, Adjunct Professor of Physics, Georgia Institute of Technology
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SAgE Research Fellow, Newcastle University
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Postdoctoral Researcher in Biological Sciences, University of Maryland, Baltimore County
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Postdoctoral Researcher, Department of Mechanical & Industrial Engineering, University of Toronto