Simple but Strong: A Mussel-Inspired Hot Curing Adhesive Based on Polyvinyl Alcohol Backbone

The strong adhesion ability of mussel foot-byssal proteins (Mfps) has inspired scientists to develop novel materials for strong and reversible adhesion, coating, antifouling, and many other applications. However, in many cases, the high costs and the tedious preparation steps of such bioinspired materials hamper the process to push them into practical application. Here a simple but effective way (one step) is presented to synthesize a mussel-inspired glue from two cheap commercially available materials: polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) and 3,4-dihydroxybenzaldehyde (DBA). This bioinspired hot curing adhesive exhibits a strong bonding ability as high as 17.3 MPa on stainless steel surfaces, which surpasses most of the commercially available adhesives.