A biofilm-derived peptide as an underwater adhesive.

A biofilm-derived peptide from Vibrio cholerae adsorbs to diverse surfaces and glues wet interfaces, enabling underwater adhesion measured by lap shear tests.

• Why it matters: Underwater adhesives are needed for industrial and biomedical use, but most molecular designs have relied mainly on marine animals rather than bacterial biofilms.
• What they did: The study combined confocal microscopy, molecular dynamics simulations, atomic force microscopy, lap shear testing, and spectroscopic tools to assess adsorption and wet-gluing, plus coaggregation with flocculant microspheres.
• The result: The peptide’s surface adsorption, wet bonding, and coaggregation with microspheres suggest new design routes for underwater adhesives inspired by natural bacterial biofilms.

AI summary of the abstract · may contain errors · not medical advice · read the paper.