University of Canterbury chemical engineering lecturer Dr Simone Dimartino (31) said the idea for a commercial water-resistant glue came to him on an Otago Peninsula walk.
He and his wife moved from Italy to Christchurch in November 2010 and the couple spent their first Kiwi Christmas in Dunedin.
As his wife looked skyward for albatrosses, he was transfixed by the seaweed being battered by waves at the bottom of the cliff.
''I was mesmerised ... the seaweed was dancing on the waves,'' Dr Dimartino said.
The ''huge power'' of the waves made the ''elegant organism'' dance.
''I thought 'Wow', for it to cling there, it must produce something very sticky.''
The best man-made adhesives failed underwater, Dr Dimartino said. He harvested bull kelp seaweed - male and female plants- at Shag Point, north of Dunedin.
At the University of Otago, the kelp was taken outside and a spotlight shone on its surface to trick it into believing breeding conditions were optimal.
''They think it is beautiful weather to have babies - and they start releasing the sperm and eggs,'' he said.
In a University of Otago laboratory, he assisted the fertilisation and reproduction of kelp.
In his research, he used newborn kelp because it needed to quickly produce mucilage- a thick, sticky, gluey substance - to stick to a rock and stop being washed away by waves and tidal currents.
The Dunedin laboratory was the only South Island facility that had the infra-red technology needed to probe a thin layer of the kelp surface.
The experiments should reveal the chemical components of kelp glue by the end of next year and then he would focus on producing a synthetic counterpart of the glue for commercial use, to ensure the sustainability of the seaweed.
''It's a unique kind of seaweed, present only here, Australia and Chile.''
The glue could be used by the nautical industry in water and the medical profession in the ''wettest system ever'' - the human body.
Medical applications for the glue could replace the stitching of wounds and arteries.
A more specific application for the natural, biodegradable and biocompatible glue would be connecting a detached placenta to a pregnant woman's uterus to allow the baby to feed again, Dr Dimartino said.
