New Scientist
April 19, 2003

Mussels give muscle

A VERY sticky glue could paradoxically help prevent bacteria and blood clots clinging to implants such as catheters.

Bare metal implants are usually covered with a non-stick layer to ward off clots and infections. But glues used to attach these coatings aren't water-resistant and often degrade. Different glues are also required depending on the metal used.

So Jeffrey Dalsin and his team at Northwestern University in Chicago turned to mussels, which use a resin to stick to a variety of surfaces including rocks and speeding boat hulls.

They extracted the amino acid dopa from the mussel resin and attached it to the non-sticky polymer polyethylene glycol. The amino acid anchored the polymer to gold and titanium surfaces for two weeks, longer than the lifetime of a typical catheter. (Journal of the American Chemical Society, vol 125, p 4253).

New Scientist