Mucus, mixed with mussels, makes a heck of an adhesive.
Mussels produce a sort of waterproof glue, which is much more powerful than synthetic adhesives and keeps them from being washed away. By combining the power of this muscle 'glue' with the antibacterial power of mucins (the proteins in mucus), researchers have created a waterproof adhesive that is pretty much ideal for the medical field. The type of bond between the proteins in mussel glue and mucus is what makes them almost impossibly strong. Glue is an incredibly useful substance. Wood glue can cement important furniture joints, craft glue can allow children to express creativity, fabric glue can enable the creation of wearable art... the list goes on. But what if we had a glue that we could use to bond things to our own human bodies—and not only keep things bonded, but keep them sterile as well? Well, one might be on the horizon, thanks to mussel secretions and mucus. The thing about a body-funtional glue is that is both needs to have a tenacious hold on dry or wet surfaces and keep microbes out. And this is exactly what a team of engineers from MIT and Freie Universität Berlin found when combining mucins (proteins from mucus) with a polymer inspired by the sticky substance that mussels secrete. The resulting gluey hydrogel could have biomedical applications like coating medical implants, which would help to keep them in place and prevent infection. Related Story Scientists Discover 200,000-Year-Old Glue Recipe The plaque secreted by a…