A biomimetic adhesive with high adhesion strength and toughness comprising soybean meal, chitosan, and condensed tannin-functionalized boron nitride nanosheets

Soybean meal (SM)-based adhesive can solve the issues of formaldehyde emission and over-reliance of aldehyde-based resins but suffers from poor water resistance, weak adhesion strength, and high brittleness. Herein, a high-performance adhesive inspired by lobster cuticular sclerotization was developed using catechol-rich condensed tannin-functionalized boron nitride nanosheets (CT@BNNSs), amino-containing chitosan (CS), and SM (CT@BNNSs/CS/SM). The oxidative crosslinking between the catechol and amino, initiated by oxygen at high temperatures, formed a strengthened and water-resistant interior network. These strong intermolecular interactions induced by phenol–amine synergy accompanied by the reinforcement of uniformly dispersed BNNSs improved the load transfer and energy dissipation capacity, endowing the adhesive with great cohesion strength. Given these synergistic effects, the biomimetic CT@BNNSs/CS/SM adhesive caused noticeable improvements in water tolerance, mechanical strength, and toughness over the neat SM adhesive, e.g., enhanced wet shear strength (1.46 vs. 0.66 MPa, respectively), boiling water shear strength (0.92 vs. 0.43 MPa, respectively), and debonding work (0.368 vs. 0.113 J, respectively). Thus, this study provided a green and low-cost bionic strategy for the preparation of high-performance biomass adhesives. •An advanced adhesive inspired by lobster cuticular sclerotization is reported.•Oxygen at high temperatures initiated the crosslinking between CT@BNNSs and CS/SM.•Such phenol–amine synergy endowed the adhesive with great cohesion strength.•Strong intermolecular interactions and BNNSs reinforcement improved the adhesive's toughness.