Summary Draft 1 (geCKo Material)


"Artificial gecko skin comes out of Professor Mark Cutkosky’s Stanford lab" (Muller, 2023) and is now marketed as geCKo Materials. It is an adhesive that is inspired by the incredible way geckos can scale walls and even move about on the ceiling. The key feature of this adhesive is that it basically mimics the gecko’s foot structure, which allows it to cling to almost any surface be it rough or smooth due to it being able to make close contact with the surface. "This field is a rather young one as it was born out of the discovery of the mechanism of adhesion in the gecko in 2002, namely Van der Waals forces" (Hawkes, 2015). Unlike how sticky tape works, where the tape sticks due to the chemicals found on one surface of the tape, gecko adhesive is a dry adhesive that is easy to remove without the use of force at all and it leaves no marks or residue. Although currently it is impossible to replicate the intricate branching structure of a gecko’s foot, the tape makes use of a crude approximation of it.

Gecko Materials, drawing inspiration from the remarkable adhesive capabilities of gecko feet, are poised to revolutionize adhesion in the future as it offer various industries with innovative, versatile and sustainable solutions to their different bonding needs. References:

Muller, D. [Veritasium]. (2023, Jan 24). The Stickiest *Non-Sticky* Substance [Video] YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vS0TuIPoeBs&ab_channel=Veritasium

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Formal Introductory Letter

Dear Professor Blackstone, How are you? I hope this letter finds you well. I am writing this letter to you in hopes that you can get to know me in a deeper sense, rather than just  another unnoticed face in your in class. To give you a little background of me, I like to begin my story from my former Secondary school, Saint Patrick's where I started falling in love with science.  As the years go by, I grew more fond of the mysteries and answers that science could explain. I wanted to further my studies in Biology as I feel that the human anatomy is an area that is full of questions and that perked my interest. As such, I opted for a placement in the Veterinary Technology in Temasek Polytechic. But life got an interesting way to push you into the path you are meant to go. I ended up with my last choice which was Biomedical Engineering. You could say this was a blessing in disguise as that course made me realized that Biology was not for me, but it also opened my eyes to the wonders o
Read more

Final Reflections

  Module learning The goal that I set for myself at the beginning of the semester was to improve my confidence in terms of public speaking and communication with my peers. Throughout the semester, I have engaged in various activities and assignments, the most prominent of which are report writing and presentation, that have allowed me to work towards this goal. At the start of this module, I was prepared to do most of the work individually. However, right off the bat, the reader response topic that I picked paired me with someone to work with that also shared the same topic. I felt that it was out of my comfort zone as I preferred to write summaries and reports by myself, as that way I can police the work without the need to consult someone else. As every paired or group project goes, there will be differences in terms of writing styles and research priorities presented by different members. What was important at the start was to just write out a reader response that is good enou
Read more

My first draft

Image
  geCKo Materials, a company that is producing artificial gecko material, came out of Professor Mark Cutkosky’s lab in Stanford. It is an adhesive that is inspired by the way geckos can scale walls and move about on the ceiling. The key feature of this adhesive is that it mimics the gecko’s foot structure, which allows it to cling to almost any rough or smooth surface. If a toe from a gecko’s is placed under a microscope, it can be observed that it is made up of very fine structures called spatulas which are less than one micrometre across. Although currently it is impossible to replicate this intricate branching structure, the tape makes use of a crude approximation of it. Instead of spatulas, the tape is covered with rows of sharp silicon wedges with tips that are around one micrometre. Unlike how sticky tape works, where the tape sticks due to the chemicals found on one surface of the tape, gecko adhesive is a dry adhesive that is easy to remove without the use of force at all and
Read more