A University of Delaware professor is drawing inspiration from shellfish to develop resilient adhesives for affordable housing and next-generation infrastructure.

Jovan Tatar, an assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering and an affiliated faculty in the Center for Composite Materials, received a prestigious NSF CAREER Award to create new durable adhesive joints for concrete structures by mimicking mussel adhesion — how the shellfish stick to things.

Concrete — a mix of water, gravel or rock, and cement — is a useful building material for many structures, from museums to bridges. To join two hardened concrete surfaces together and glue other structural materials to concrete, engineers must use a special adhesive, a super-strong type of glue.

Existing concrete adhesives are not durable when exposed to moisture, said Tatar, and that’s a problem. Most adhesives do not bond well to damp surfaces, and concrete is, intrinsically, a moist material. In addition, many concrete structures, such as bridges and building exteriors, are often exposed to water.

In fields such as the automotive and aerospace industries, engineers use special adhesives to accelerate production, prolong product life, reduce stress concentrations, and control maintenance costs, said Tatar.

“Similar benefits could be attained in the structural engineering field with adhesives that are specifically designed to withstand the environmental stressors and structural demand in concrete structures,” he said. “This need in the field has inspired me to seek nature-inspired solutions for durable adhesive bonding to concrete.”
Mussels piqued his interest because of their ability to establish and maintain adhesion underwater, on substances made of minerals similar to those found in concrete. Before they end up in your bouillabaisse, mussels live in shallow waters and make special proteins that allow them to plod along and stick to surfaces.

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