title: Antifouling properties of hydrogels.
abstract: Marine sessile organisms easily adhere to submerged solids such as rocks, metals and plastics, but not to seaweeds and fishes, which are covered with soft and wet 'hydrogel'. Inspired by this fact, we have studied long-term antifouling properties of hydrogels against marine sessile organisms. Hydrogels, especially those containing hydroxy group and sulfonic group, show excellent antifouling activity against barnacles both in laboratory assays and in the marine environment. The extreme low settlement on hydrogelsin vitroandin vivois mainly caused by antifouling properties against the barnacle cypris.
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Soft and Wet Matter, Faculty of Advanced Life Science, Hokkaido University 060-0810 Sapporo, Japan.
authors.forename: Takayuki
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Murosaki
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Soft and Wet Matter, Graduate School of Science, Hokkaido University 060-0810 Sapporo, Japan.
authors.forename: Nafees
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Ahmed
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Soft and Wet Matter, Faculty of Advanced Life Science, Hokkaido University 060-0810 Sapporo, Japan.
authors.forename: Jian
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Ping Gong
keywords: antifouling; barnacles; biofouling; hydrogels; marine sessile organisms; polymer