Michael D. Bartlett, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA (PhD Advisor) : Proved a role model for numerous students without being a tyrant and taught me how to read, write, think, and speak.
Seung Geol Lee, Pusan National University, Pusan, South Korea (Undergraduate Research Advisor, now at UNIST) : Invited me to the research world.
Edwin P. Chan, National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), Gaithersburg, MD : Provide advice on career choices, polymer physics, and life.
Hyunwoo Yuk, SanaHeal, Inc, Boston, MA : Taught me how to be generous in academia and inspired me with visual graphics of my later-stage publications.
Alfred J. Crosby, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, MA : Taught me the importance of mechanics in adhesion science and provided career advice.
Jason Clapper, 3M, Saint Paul, MN : Provided lots of career advice and taught me how to influence others.
David A. Dillard, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA : Taught me how to approach theoretical mechanics carefully.
Vivek Sharma, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL : Provided honest advice on how to approach research. This page is inspired by his website.
I would also like to extend my sincere gratitude to Chanhong (Virginia Tech), Elizabeth (Emerson), Edoardo (Dow), John (3M), Hyunki (3M), Kshitish (Rogers Corporation), Eric (University of Nebraska-Lincoln), Martin Thuo (NCSU), Niels (Lehigh University), Josh (Apple), Chris Williams (Virginia Tech), Ling Li (Virginia Tech), and Naomi (Georgia Tech).
Scholars and publications that influenced me
Kevin Kendall (University of Birmingham), Manoj K. Chaudhury (Lehigh University), Kenneth R. Shull (Northwestern University), Costantino Creton (ESPCI Paris), Alan N. Gent (University of Akron), Steven Abbott (Steven Abbott TCNF Ltd.), Zhigang Suo (Harvard), and Pierre-Gilles de Gennes (Collège de France) have immensely influenced how I think about adhesion science and soft materials in general. For students and professionals who wish to enhance their understanding of how adhesives and coatings behave and how they should be designed and tested, the articles below will serve as reliable references.
The peeling of flexible laminates, A. J. Kinloch, C. C. Lau, and J. G. Williams, International Journal of Fracture, 1994 (Detailed factors for determining the adhesion energy in peel mode)
Axisymmetric adhesion tests of soft materials, K. R. Shull, D. Ahn, W-L. Chen, C. M. Flanigan, and A. J. Crosby, Macromol. Chem. Phys., 1998 (Review/experimental paper on details of interfacial contributions to overall adhesion performance from the revised JKR approach that considers finite size effects)
On Stickiness, C. Gay and L. Leibler, Physics Today, 1999 (A short yet insightful 5-page essay on the complexity of adhesion)
Soft and hard adhesion, J. Y. Chung and M. K. Chaudhury, J. Adhes., 2005 (Pull off an object from thin and thick elastomeric coatings)
Fracture and adhesion of soft materials: a review, C. Creton and M. Ciccotti, Rep. Prog. Phys., 2016 (Best review paper that provides a framework for thinking about designing and understanding elastomers, gels, and PSAs from the polymer engineering perspectives)