Nanofabricated gecko-like fasteners with adhesive hairs for disposable absorbent articles
AssigneeKimberly-Clark Worldwide, Inc.
InventorsJeffrey Dean Lindsay, Fung-Jou Chen, Lisha Yu, Nadezhda Efremova
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Abstract
A disposable absorbent article has a nanofabricated attachment means having adhesive hairs disposed on a substrate wherein the hairs are effective to adhesively engage an opposing surface having a polymeric film or a fibrous web. In another embodiment, the absorbent article has a gecko-like fastener including a substrate and a plurality of adhesive hairs arising from the substrate having a base section, midsection, and top section, a height of about 0.5 microns to about 8 millimeters, and a diameter greater than about 0.05 microns.
Claims45
A disposable absorbent article comprising a nanofabricated attachment means comprising adhesive hairs disposed on a flexible substrate, wherein said hairs are effective to adhesively engage an opposing surface comprising a polymeric film or a fibrous web, wherein the attachment means has a packing density of at least 500 hairs per square millimeter, wherein said hairs do not consist of a spatula or protrusion positioned at a terminal end of the hairs, and wherein said hairs have an average diameter of about 50 microns or less and an average height-to-diameter ratio of about 3 or greater.
A disposable absorbent article comprising a nanofabricated attachment means comprising adhesive hairs disposed on a flexible substrate, wherein the attachment means has a packing density of at least 500 hairs per square millimeter, wherein said hairs do not consist of a spatula or protrusion positioned at a terminal end of the hairs, and wherein said hairs are effective to adhesively engage an opposing surface comprising a polymeric film or fibrous web with an average adhesive force of 10 nanoNewtons or greater per hair.
A disposable absorbent article comprising a gecko-like adhesive fastener including a flexible substrate, a plurality of adhesive hairs rising from said substrate, said hairs each having a base section, a midsection, a top section, a height of about 0.5 microns to about 8 millimeters, and a diameter of about 0.05 microns to about 50 microns, and wherein said hairs do not consist of a spatula or protrusion positioned at a terminal end of the top section.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.