New adhesive surface modeled on a remora works underwater
Most adhesives can’t stick to wet surfaces because water and other fluids disrupt the adhesive’s bonding mechanisms. This problem, though, has been beautifully solved by evolution in remora suckerfish, which use an adhesive disk on top of their heads to attach to animals like dolphins, sharks, and even manta rays. A team of MIT scientists has now taken a close look at these remora disks and reverse-engineered them. “Basically, we looked at nature for inspiration,” says Giovanni Traverso, a prof