Degradable Underwater Adhesive Utilizing Free Radical Ring-Opening Polymerization

Inspired by the amino acid residues in mussel adhesion proteins, vinyl polymer underwater adhesives containing dopamine structures have gradually become a research hot spot. Researchers have done a lot of work on how to improve the bonding properties, mechanical properties, and rapid response properties of dopamine-based adhesives. However, vinyl polymers are not degradable, which limit their application in the biomedical field. It is considered to be the most promising method to achieve the degradation of vinyl polymers by free radical ring-opening polymerization of vinyl monomers and cyclic ketene acetals. In this study, we used N-(3,4-dihydroxyphenethyl) methacrylamide (DMA) and 2-methyl-1,3-dioxane (MDO) as raw materials to synthesize biodegradable copolymers P­(MDO–DMA) with different compositions by free radical ring-opening polymerization. We carried out adhesion strength and in vitro degradation experiments on polymer adhesives under different conditions. The results showed that the prepared copolymers had good adhesion and biodegradability. This is the result of the synergistic effect of the two functional monomers in the system. DMA achieves adhesion performance and MDO gives effective degradability. We believe that this will expand the current limited application scenarios and provide exciting prospects for applications in areas such as drug delivery and tissue engineering.