Abstract
AbstractPolymer adhesives play an important role in industries in the areas of multilayer packaging, structural bonding, wearables, and medical adhesives. The adhesive strength involves two main components. The first component is a function of thermodynamic surface or interfacial energies, and the second component is related to bulk dissipation. The bulk dissipation term can contribute to an almost thousand‐time enhancement in adhesion strength compared to the thermodynamic work of adhesion. In this article, we discuss the basic formulations to calculate the surface and interfacial energies of solids and relate these parameters to the thermodynamic work of adhesion. We also discuss the mechanisms that contribute to the velocity‐dependent adhesive strength. Since almost all practical surfaces are rough, we present the recent theoretical and experimental data on how roughness affects adhesion. The experimental techniques to measure surface structure, thermodynamic work of adhesion, and fracture strength of adhesives are also described in this article. The recent literature on natural adhesive systems has attracted significant interest and provides a brief discussion on how natural systems can be an important source of inspiration for new chemistry and structure to optimize adhesion for various environmental conditions. We end this article with a section summarizing the industrial applications of polymer adhesion.