Silicone elastomers, as good sealants and adhesives,
have been
widely applied in protective coatings, architectural decoration, electronic
packaging, and other fields. However, the traditional cross-linking
of silicone elastomers is highly dependent on toxic catalysts or heavy
metals, which may inevitably lead to severe environmental pollution.
Moreover, most silicone elastomers suffer from a poor adhesive performance.
In this study, inspired by the high adhesion properties of mussels,
an eco-friendly and catalyst-free silicone elastomer with high adhesion
properties was prepared by using dopamine as a cross-linker and amino-functionalized
polysiloxane as a base. Under mild conditions (pH = 8.5), dopamine
was self-polymerized and underwent Michael addition and Schiff base
reactions with amino groups to form robust elastomers. It was found
that the cross-linking degree gradually increases with the dopamine
content increasing from 2 to 6%, and the solvent resistance and thermal
stability exhibit significant improvement. Meanwhile, the tensile
strength increased by 245% from 0.22 to 0.77 MPa. Especially, the
as-obtained silicone elastomers have excellent adhesion to different
materials. The lap shear strength with aluminum substrates (1.09 MPa)
is 3.6 times higher than that of conventional silicone elastomers.
The development of catalyst-free bioinspired silicone elastomers with
high adhesion may shed light on the research of eco-friendly silicone
materials and offer innovative insight for mussel-inspired adhesives.