Slug Slime Inspires Scientists To Invent Sticky Surgical Glue
The words "strong" and "inspiring" are not usually assigned to garden slugs. But slug slime inspired materials scientists to invent a new kind of adhesive that could one day help heal human wounds.
The European slug is average in every way: slimy, brownish, shorter than a credit card.
But Arion subfuscus has a minor superpower: When it's scared, it can glue itself to wet surfaces very well, and do so while remaining bendy.
"That's a very challenging problem in the material and also in the biomedical world," says , a materials scientist with Harvard's Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering. "Those represent the biggest challenge in terms of adhesive development."
