A good adhesive is unequivocally sticky. A great adhesive is sticky until you don't want it to be sticky anymore — a label on cardboard until it's time to recycle it. Medical tape on a cut until the wound heals. A GWAR poster on a bedroom wall until your parents kick you out.
Virginia Tech chemists are going for great by building degradation into the design.
John Matson, Josh Worch, and their teams are developing extra-sticky adhesives that can be broken down into their original components once they are no longer needed.
Polymers: Ancient Greek for 'many parts'
A polymer is a long chain of molecules linked in a repeating pattern, like a multicolored string of Christmas lights. Like the lights, polymers can get tangled up.
These entanglements give polymers a range of properties. Some entangled polymers make hard plastics, while others form materials that are rubbery, elastic, soft, conductive, resistant — and, of course, sticky.
