Cohesion-decohesion asymmetry in geckos
Biological Physics
2015-06-15 v1 Soft Condensed Matter
Abstract
Lizards and insects can strongly attach to walls and then detach applying negligible additional forces. We propose a simple mechanical model of this phenomenon which implies active muscle control. We show that the detachment force may depend not only on the properties of the adhesive units, but also on the elastic interaction among these units. By regulating the scale of such cooperative interaction, the organism can actively switch between two modes of adhesion: delocalized (pull off) and localized (peeling).
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.1303.4269,
title = {Cohesion-decohesion asymmetry in geckos},
author = {Giuseppe Puglisi and Lev Truskinovsky},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1303.4269},
year = {2015}
}