Synthetic gecko foot-hair micro/nano-structures as dry adhesives

Abstract

1 To whom correspondance should be addressed. This paper proposes techniques to fabricate synthetic gecko foot-hairs as dry adhesives for future wallclimbing and surgical robots, and models for understanding the synthetic hair design issues. Two nanomolding fabrication techniques are proposed: the first method uses nanoprobe indented flat wax surface and the second one uses a nano-pore membrane as a template. These templates are molded with silicone rubber, polyimide, etc. type of polymers under vacuum. Next, design parameters such as length, diameter, stiffness, density, and orientation of hairs are determined for non-matting and rough surface adaptability. Preliminary micro/nano-hair prototypes showed adhesion close to the predicted values for natural specimens (around 100 nN each). Keywords: Biomimetic adhesives, pressure controlled dry adhesives, adhesion forces, polymer micro/nano-fabrication, micro/nano-robotics, nanoindentation, and nanomolding. 2 1