Adhesive Chemistry Developments and Trends

Since the first symposium on Recent Advances in Adhesion, held September, 1971 in Washington, D. C. , this Division of the American Chemical Society has continuously sponsored several symposia on adhesion and adhesives. The chemists have gradually realized the importance of adhesion in various fields of science and technology. During these years, the science of adhesion has steadily grown along with progress in surface science and fracture mechanics. Moreover, new adhesives have been invented and applied in actual structures, for example, structural and aerospace adhesives. In response to socio-economic demands, new forms of adhesives have been introduced to combat the problems of pollution and to promote energy-conservation. The developments of hot-melt adhesives, waterborne adhesives, and radiation-curable adhesives are vivid examples of successes in solving some of the problems. As chemists, our hatural desire is to understand how those new adhesives and new forms of adhesives are made. Thus, we are interested in learning about the chemistry of adhesives so that we may create new generations of materials to satisfy future needs. It was based on this common interest that w~ set forth to org’anize this Symposium on Recent Developments in Adhesive Chemistry. It was held from March 21 through 23, 1983 in the Westin Hotel, Seattle, Washington. The Symposium was very well attended. As a matter of fact, for the first two sessions, we had to move from the smaller Mt. St.