Finished Adhesives and Sealants

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How much time do you think you spend in a day looking at a screen, be it a cell phone, tablet, computer screen or television? I know I’m sometimes guilty of checking my email on my phone one last time before bed—long after I’ve asked my kids to turn off and put away their devices. Research has shown that people spend an average of 8 hrs, 41 min on media devices, compared to 8 hrs, 21 min sleeping a day—a pretty remarkable statistic. Manufacturers of these devices are driving innovation in adhesives and sealants.

Design is all about tradeoffs. Mobile device manufacturers have to balance everything from cost and aesthetics to performance and durability―and then design a product that can both survive and thrive in today’s competitive consumer markets.

Whether bonding metal to plastic, silicon to glass, polymers to other polymers of different durometers, biological content to polymeric microtiter plates or even bonding to polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE), plasma can be used to promote adhesion. Adhesion promotion can be achieved by increasing the surface free energy through several mechanisms, including precision cleaning, chemically or physically modifying the surface, increasing surface area by roughening, and primer coatings, according to Michael Barden of PVA TePla, a company that designs and manufactures plasma systems.

Methyl methacrylate (MMA) flooring systems are fast becoming a popular choice for large-scale commercial and industrial construction projects due to their many advantages. Given the right conditions, an MMA floor can reach a full physical and chemical cure within only 60 min of installation. This means that the surface can be subjected to full operational use under an extremely tight turnaround, especially when compared to the days or weeks that most epoxy, cementitious urethane, or concrete floors take to cure.

Electric mobility and photovoltaics play a vital role in protecting the climate and conserving fossil resources. Combining them leads to even more innovative and sustainable mobility concepts. To show that these kinds of solutions are already feasible using state-of-the-art materials and technologies, a team of around 45 young researchers has developed a solar-powered electric car.