MIT Engineers developed strong surgical tape that detaches on demand

Team Udayavani, Jun 25, 2020, 7:08 PM IST

MIT engineers had last year developed a double-sided adhesive that could firmly stick to wet surfaces such as biological tissues. It is said that the adhesive could seal up rips and tears in lungs and intestines within seconds.

Now, they have further developed their adhesive so that it can be detached from the underlying tissue without causing any damage.

By applying a liquid solution, it can be peeled away like a slippery gel in case it needs to be adjusted during surgery

Xuanhe Zhao, professor of mechanical engineering and of civil and environmental engineering, said, “This is like a painless Band-Aid for internal organs. You put the adhesive on, and if for any reason you want to take it off, you can do so on-demand, without pain.”

In order to make the adhesive detachable, they added a new disulfide linker molecule, which can be placed between covalent bonds with a tissue’s surface proteins to the original material.