Bioinspired design and fabrication of green-environmental dry adhesive with robust wide-tip shape

Abstract

In this communication, we have introduced bioinspired polymeric dry adhesive structures made by using low-expertise yet robust over-etching fabrication process and chemical treatment method. The structure of gecko-foot in nature has been adopted into various applications for its remarkable smart adhesion performance. Although a lot of methods have been proposed to fabricate the gecko-inspired dry adhesion systems, they have faced on problem of structural failure of wide-tip on the top of the micro structures. To solve the problem, we have focused on developing proper wide-tip shape of the polymeric dry adhesive structures. Through the controlled over-etching process and C4F8 deposition method, we have made wide-tip microstructures without any structural failure. As a result, we develop the robust dry adhesive structures with highly reproducible and accurate wide-tip arrays for strong potential applications such as in green-environmental industries.