Two bifunctional aldehydes (i.e., glyoxal and glutaraldehyde) are used as the crosslinking agents to improve paper wet strength in the presence of fully hydrolyzed poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) as a co-reactant. These bifunctional aldehydes alone improve paper wet strength but diminish its folding endurance. The use of PVA as a co-reactant not only improves paper wet strength but also increases its dry strength and folding endurance. Glutaraldehyde is able to impart much higher levels of wet strength to the treated paper than glyoxal when a catalyst is present. The wet strength of the treated paper increases as the amount of PVA added is increased, and it also increases as the molecular weight (M-w) of the PVA increases. The data suggest that the reaction between glutaraldehyde and PVA promotes the formation of interfiber crosslinking, thus improving the wet strength without diminishing the flexibility of the treated paper. The use of a catalyst is critical to achieve high levels of durable wet strength of the treated paper. We studied the effects of different Lewis acids as the catalysts for crosslinking of pulp cellulose by glutaraldehyde and found that Zn(NO3)(2) is the most effective one. (C) 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Tric.