The nanometer size of the tiny hair is the key to the secret of strong stickiness of gecko's feet, by which the hair can achieve the maximum adhesion strength that is insensitive to the interfacial flaws with substrate surface. But the question why the hairs have not been smaller is not answered yet. In this study, we derived a geometric parameter of the surface structures considering lateral interaction among hairs, which gives a critical size below which these hairs will bunch together and cause failure of the adhesion, suggesting a lower limit of the dimension of hairs on gecko's feet.
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