The Pressure Sensitive Tape Council (PSTC) recently announced it has named Kyle Heimbach, an R&D chemist at Avery Dennison Materials Group, the recipient of its 2013 Carl Dahlquist Award. The award is named for innovator Dahlquist, who developed the Dahlquist criterion of tack, determining the modulus value of a material necessary for it to be low enough and tacky enough to be considered a pressure-sensitive adhesive. Heimbach presented “Transposable Adhesives: Acrylic Pressure Sensitive Adhesives with Reactive Components” at the PSTC TECH 36 technical seminar, which took place May 15-17 in New Orleans, La.

Heimbach has worked for Avery Dennison’s polymer research and development group for five years. He obtained his bachelor’s degree in chemistry from the Pennsylvania State University in 2007, where he also completed three cooperative education rotations in Avery Dennison’s polymer division prior to his five years in R&D. His work has focused on controlled radical polymerization techniques, most notably nitroxide mediated polymerization (NMP) and reversible addition fragmentation chain transfer (RAFT) to obtain high/100% solids materials.