Polymeric materials produced from fossil fuels have been intimately linked to the
development of industrial activities in the 20th century and, consequently, to the …

Water and adhesives have a conflicting relationship as demonstrated by the failure of most
man-made adhesives in underwater environments. However, living creatures routinely …

Barnacles are notorious marine fouling organisms, whose life cycle initiates with the
planktonic larva, followed by the free-swimming cyprid that voluntarily explores, and …

Barnacles are intriguing, not only with respect to their importance as fouling organisms, but
also in terms of the mechanism of underwater adhesion, which provides a platform for …

The nanoscale morphology and protein secondary structure of barnacle adhesive plaques
were characterized using atomic force microscopy (AFM), far-UV circular dichroism (CD) …

In the past years, research into surfaces that inhibit marine biofouling has focused on
designing environmentally friendly materials due to current bans on toxic coatings. This …

Enzymes and biochemical mechanisms essential to survival are under extreme selective
pressure and are highly conserved through evolutionary time. We applied this evolutionary …

Barnacles adhere by producing a mixture of cement proteins (CPs) that organize into a
permanently bonded layer displayed as nanoscale fibers. These cement proteins share no …

Biofouling, the attachment and growth of organisms on submerged, man-made surfaces, has
plagued ship operators for at least 2500 years. Accumulation of biofouling, including …

The barnacle, infraclass Cirripedia, is the only sessile crustacean. The adult firmly attaches
its base to a foreign surface in the water via an underwater adhesive called cement. The …