Adhesion paradox: Why adhesion is usually not observed for macroscopic solids

Abstract

The adhesion paradox refers to the observation that for most solid objects no adhesion can be detected when they are separated from a state of molecular contact. The adhesion paradox results from surface roughness, and we present experimental and theoretical results that show that adhesion in most cases is "killed" by the longest-wavelength roughness. In addition, adhesion experiments between a human finger and a clean glass plate were carried out, and for a dry finger no macroscopic adhesion occurred. We suggest that the observed decrease in the contact area with increasing shear force results from nonadhesive finger-glass contact mechanics, involving large deformations of complex layered material.