There are many animals which attach some substrates and do not move in the sea (sessile marine animals), whereas most of land animals are free moving animals. The barnacles and ascidians which are one of the research materials of the authors are representative sessile marine animals. For human being, sessile marine animals often become the harm. The study of material and the chemical substance to prevent it is extensively conducted. On the other hand, the property to adhere quickly and stably underwater is the characteristic that is not found in existing adhesives, and it can become the key for developing new ‘biomimetic’ adhesives or materials for novel surface/interface structure. Here in this report we summarize recent advances on barnacles and ascidians as representative marine sessile animals and also mention about the quick attachment and detachment by sea urchin and starfish for moving using adhesion, giving some comments on the present conditions of the studies on adhesion mechanism and the prospects for the future application development.

There are many different types of adhesives tailored for different purposes. The majority of these adhesives are based on petroleum products which are not environmentally friendly, often constitute a health hazard, and are also likely to become scarcer in the near future. Bio-based adhesives have attracted intense interest because of stricter environmental and health regulations. In this report, we will demonstrate bio-based super adhesives with excellent adhesive strength using the semi-flexible bio-monomers, 3,4-dihydroxyhydrocinnamic acid (DHHCA) and 3-(3-hydroxyphenyl)propionic acid (3HPPA) for medical field.

This review shows synthesis and application of catechol-containing random and block copolymers. We successfully synthesized amphiphilic random copolymers containing catechol moieties as side chains by free radical copolymerization of dopamine methacrylic amide and hydrophobic monomers including styrene. The synthesized amphiphilic copolymers firmly adhered onto inorganic materials and change surface properties from hydrophilic to hydrophobic. The polymer-immobilized inorganic nanoparticles can be dispersed in hydrophobic organic solvents and form porous hierarchic films after casting under humid conditions followed by calcination. Block copolymers containing catechol moieties have also been synthesized reversible addition-fragmentation transfer (RAFT) polymerization of 3,4-dihydroxy styrene and styrene followed by deprotection of methoxy groups. Metal ions can be reduced by using the synthesized block copolymers as templates and reductants, metal nanoparticles consequently formed by simple addition of metal ions into solution or film of catecholcontaining block copolymers.

Neutron reflectometry (NR) is an essential experimental technique for structural analysis on material interfaces and thin films, because it can probe the structures along the depth direction with a high resolution of a sub-nm scale in a non-destructive manner utilizing optical reflection property of neutron at flat interfaces. The neutron is capable of distinguishing between isotopes, and especially there is the large difference in coherent scattering length between isotopes of hydrogen: light hydrogen (H) and deuterium (D), which is one of major elements constituting soft matters such as polymers, surfactants, lipids, etc. The neutron contrast can be introduced in soft matters without significant change in their physical properties by replacing all or part of H with D in the samples (deuterium labeling). Also, the neutron exhibits high transmissivity for materials, so that NR can examine deeply-buried interfaces in materials in a non-destructive manner. Here, the advantages of NR for structural analysis on soft interfaces are explained by introducing the experimental examples of polymer thin films prepared on silicon substrates, though NR can be adopted for various material interfaces including free interfaces such as liquid surface.