THE CHALLENGE
The challenge in creating effective underwater adhesion systems lies in bridging a critical gap between advanced materials science and real-world usability, especially for industries like marine robotics, offshore maintenance, and biomedical handling. Traditional solutions either bond too permanently, require ideal flat surfaces, consume too much power, or simply don’t work well underwater due to issues like fluid infiltration, surface roughness, and ionic interference. From a business perspective, this means there is still no scalable, reliable, and reusable adhesion technology that can grip a wide variety of surfaces—wet, dry, smooth, or curved—without damaging them or requiring constant manual adjustment. This technological shortfall has held back the development of autonomous underwater tools and manipulators, creating a major unmet need for a versatile, cost-effective, and intelligent gripping solution that can operate across diverse environments and substrates.
OUR SOLUTION
We have a bio-inspired, pneumatically controlled adhesive system that offers strong, reversible grip on wet, dry, rough, or curved surfaces—overcoming the limitations of traditional suction, glue, or magnetic systems. At its core is a soft silicone stalk and a flexible membrane that can switch between attachment and release in under 50 milliseconds by simply adjusting air pressure. This enables a high-strength grip (over 60 kPa) and a switching ratio more than 450 times, meaning reliable hold and instant release without residue or damage. Built-in sensors and a microcontroller allow fully autonomous operation, making it ideal for integration into robotic hands, underwater tools, or wearable devices. Unlike current solutions that are either permanent, power-hungry, or sensitive to surface imperfections, our scalable and durable system brings smart, on-demand adhesion to industries like marine robotics, biomedical handling, and industrial automation. This technology offers an improvement on the basic technology presented in VTIP 23-003.
Figure: Overview of the process
Advantages:
- Ultra-fast, high-contrast switching (>450× adhesion change in <50 ms)
- Robust grip on rough, curved surfaces with low preload
- Autonomous sensorized control with real-time actuation
- Scalable, repeatable adhesion in diverse fluid environments
Potential Application:
- Underwater robotic grippers for inspection and repair
- Wearable gloves for diver-assisted marine operations
- Wet-environment industrial automation (pick-and-place systems)
- Reversible surgical adhesives and medical device stabilization
