Universal bioinspired adhesives for arbitrary unknown surfaces toward dexterous robotic manipulation.

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Learn more: PMC Disclaimer | PMC Copyright Notice Microsyst Nanoeng . 2026 Jun 3;12:213. doi: 10.1038/s41378-026-01338-6 Universal bioinspired adhesives for arbitrary unknown surfaces toward dexterous robotic manipulation Duorui Wang 1, 2 , Ronghong Wei 2 , Jinyu Zhang 2 , Tianyi Xu 2 , Hongmiao Tian 2, ✉ , Xiangming Li 1, 2 , Xiaoliang Chen 1, 2 , Chunhui Wang 2 , Jinyou Shao 1, 2 Author information Article notes Copyright and License information 1 Frontier Institute of Science and Technology (FIST), Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, Shaanxi 710049 China 2 Micro-and Nano-Technology Research Center, State Key Laboratory for Manufacturing Systems Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, Shaanxi 710049 China ✉ Corresponding author. Received 2026 Feb 1; Revised 2026 Apr 13; Accepted 2026 May 7; Collection date 2026. © The Author(s) 2026 Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License, which permits any non-commercial use, sharing, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if you modified the licensed material. You do not have permission under this licence to share adapted material derived from this article or parts of it. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ . PMC Copyright notice PMCID: PMC13234010  PMID: 42236683 Abstract Dexterous robotic hands are pivotal for complex manipulation in unstructured environments, yet they face significant challenges in reliably grasping fragile, heavy, or irregularly shaped objects using conventional friction-based methods. Gecko-inspired adhesion technology presents a compelling alternative, yet remain challenge in achieving reliable adhesion across arbitrary unknown surfaces. Here, we propose a universal bioinspired adhesive for arbitrary unknown surfaces toward dexterous robotic manipulation. The adhesive comprises a top layer with a micro core-shell mushroom array that enables adaptive adhesion to microscale roughness via soft-rigid stiffness modulation, a middle rigid thin layer, and a bottom hierarchical soft pillar array for macro-scale contour adaptation via rotation of the thin layer and compliance of the pillars. Importantly, the proposed structure is fabricated in one step through the electric field-induced growth of multilayer polymers, with precise control over their morphological features and stiffness characteristics. Experiment shows a tenfold adhesion enhancement on arbitrary surfaces versus conventional structures, achieving unprecedented adaptability. Furthermore, grasping applications using proposed adhesive-based multi-fingered dexterous robot demonstrated stable manipulation of diverse objects, including fragile, heavy, irregularly shaped, rough-textured, and high-torque-loading specimens, endows robots with extensive target adaptability and operational stability unattainable through conventional mechanical clamping actions alone. Subject terms: Structural properties, Electrical and electronic engineering Introduction Multi-fingered dexterous robotic hands, as key hardware for embodied intelligence, with their high degrees of freedom and precise force-control capabilities, enable stable grasping of objects with various shapes and sizes, holding significant value in assembly, service, and hazardous environment operations 1 – 4 . Traditional grasping primarily relies on enveloping or pinching by the fingers, maintaining grip through friction and shape matching. However, as task complexity increases and the diversity of objects grows, conventional gripping methods still face notable limitations: excessive normal pressure can easily cause damage or deformation to extremely fragile or low-stiffness objects; for heavy or high-torque load-bearing objects, reliance solely on friction may lead to slippage or require extremely large gripping forces; and in unstructured environments with unknown surface topography, traditional gripping struggles to maintain stable contact while adapting to morphological variations. These challenges drive researchers to continuously explore novel gripping strategies, either through mechanical innovation or by incorporating sophisticated sensing systems 5 – 8 , to enhance the adaptability and stability of grasping. One approach to address these issues involves using complex image processing to precisely control grasp pose and contact forces. However, such methods typically require intricate procedures and control schemes, which can be cumbersome and difficult to generalize. In recent years, integrating functional adhesive layers at the tips of multi-fingered dexterous hands to assist or partially replace purely mechanical gripping has become an important approach to expanding robotic grasping capabilities 9 , 10 . This enables grasping with lower pressure, higher stability, and greater adaptability. Among these, gecko-inspired bioinspired dry adhesives based on van der Waals forces 11 – 14 has shown broad prospects in fields such as flexible grippers 10 , 15 – 18 , epidermal electronics 19 – 23 , and wall-climbing robots 24 – 27 , owing to its strong material universality, residue-free surfaces, and reusability. Studies have shown that introducing such adhesive layers at robotic end-effectors can significantly enhance operational stability on target surfaces, particularly enabling damage-free grasping across various materials and environments. Although existing bioinspired adhesive structures have achieved remarkable adhesion performance, even surpassing the adhesion capability of natural gecko setae on surfaces such as silicon wafers and glass 28 – 30 , their designs are often optimized for only a specific type of surface (e.g., smooth, rough, or irregular). For instance, to adapt to rough surfaces, researchers adjust the stiffness of microfiber arrays. For example, by using high-aspect-ratio or hierarchical structures to reduce the equivalent elastic modulus, or by incorporating heterogeneous materials to construct composite features such as core-shell 31 – 33 or stiffness-gradient architectures 34 – 38 , thereby increasing the actual contact area. For macroscopically irregular surfaces (e.g., curved or inclined surfaces), a common approach is to introduce phase-change materials into the backing layer of the adhesive structure 17 , 39 – 41 . Through external field modulation such as photothermal, magnetic, or pneumatic actuation, the stiffness can be temporally varied, softening upon contact and stiffening during detachment. However, in practical grasping tasks, target surfaces often exhibit diversity and unpredictability, and current dexterous hand systems still struggle to achieve stable grasping of arbitrary materials and surface topographies without relying on complex sensing and feedback control. If bioinspired adhesive structures could possess generalized adaptability across multiple surface types, rather than being designed for only a single surface category, they would significantly simplify the control complexity of grasping systems and enhance their operational robustness and reliability in unstructured environments. Regrettably, to date, no artificial adhesive structure has been reported that can achieve generalized adhesion on arbitrarily shaped surfaces (smooth, rough, or irregular), which severely limits the reliable application and widespread deployment of this technology in robotic manipulation. In fact, geckos can climb flexibly on any surface in nature, regardless of surface roughness (e.g., ceilings, walls) or non-flat contours (e.g., rocks, tree trunks), a capability that stands in stark contrast to the limited adaptability of artificial adhesive materials. This adaptability arises from dual-scale soft-rigid synergy effect: (1) microscale soft-rigid composite system: Embodied in the hierarchical setae, which exhibit high compliance in compressing to conform to nano-roughness, while maintaining high stiffness in tension to stabilize van der Waals contacts (attributed to the anisotropic keratin fiber-matrix nanostructure); (2) macroscale soft-rigid composite system: Combining compliant muscles for macro contour conformance with rigid skeletons homogenizing interfacial stresses; (3) skeletal structures also acting as synergistic hubs via bone joint rotation, transmitting forces between scales to ensure microcontact stability during macroscale adjustment (Fig. 1a ). Hence, designing a bioinspired adhesive structure mimicking gecko’s dual-scale soft-rigid synergy function would present an effective pathway toward enhancing the adhesion performance on cross-scale surface topographies. Unfortunately, achieving the controllable fabrication of such adhesive structures is extremely challenging, as it requires not only precise control over the morphological features at different scales but also coordination of the mechanical properties across different materials. Fig. 1. Schematic of the self-growth of universal bioinspired adhesives (UBA). Open in a new tab a Illustration of the synergistic muscle-skeletal-setae interactions in gecko footpads; b Schematic structure of the proposed UBA; c Schematic of the growth process of the proposed adhesives under the action of an external electric field. d Photograph of the grown adhesives with top micro core-shell mushroom-like structure and bottom macro pillar arrays; e Demonstration of the grasping ability of the adhesives on macro-micro-nano cross-scale complex surfaces, including frosted glass, A4 paper, foam plastic, beaker, glass lens, etc Results Design of universal bioinspired adhesives In this paper, we propose a universal bioinspired adhesive (UBA) for robust adhesion on arbitrary unknown surfaces. The design of UBA comprises: (i) Top micro-scale core-shell structures, with interface stiffness regulation achieved via soft-rigid composite materials, which enable gecko setae-inspired adaptive contact with surface micro-roughness via van der Waals interactions; (ii) Bottom pillar-array supporting layer, achieving muscle-like macro-scale irregular contour adaptation via elastic deformation; (iii) Middle rigid supporting layer, acting as a skeleton-like synergistic hub to coordinate multi-scale interactions, providing rotational compliance for parallel contact establishment, enhancing interface stress homogenization, and transmitting forces between top and bottom layers (Fig. 1b ). It can be seen that due to the involvement of multiple materials and multi-level structural design in UBA, conventional fabrication techniques (e.g., imprint, dipping, photolithography, 3D printing) are difficult to realize integrated fabrication of this layered structure with top micro core-shell structures, middle rigid layer and bottom macro soft pillar arrays. While electric field-driven assembly has demonstrated remarkable capabilities in orienting one-dimensional nanomaterials (e.g., carbon nanotubes, silver nanowires) for enhanced electrochemical sensing and bioelectronics, these approaches typically focus on single-scale structural arrangement rather than multi-material, cross-scale integration 42 – 44 . To this end, we propose an integrated fabrication method based on the electrically activated rheological growth of multilayer materials (Fig. 1c ). The formation process of the top core-shell structure involves the overlayered growth of bilayer polymers (soft and rigid materials), while the bottom micro-pillar array is formed through rheological growth of a single-layer soft material. When voltage is applied, two spatial electric fields with identical orientation are generated between the upper and middle plates, and between the middle and lower plates, respectively. Under electric field actuation, the bilayer polymer and the single-layer polymer overcome surface tension and viscous resistance to undergo rheological growth toward their respective top templates. Upon contacting the templates, they exhibit electrowetting-induced spreading behavior across the template surfaces. This process ultimately creates mushroom-shaped core-shell microstructures at the top and micro-pillar arrays at the bottom, achieving one-step controllable fabrication of layered bioinspired adhesive structures. The proposed fabrication process not only realizes the integrated fabrication of the core-shell mechanical features and mushroom-like geometry, but also realizes the multi-scale one-step growth of the top micro-scale structure ( ~ μm) and the bottom macro-pillar array ( ~ mm), thus effectively establishing the cross-scale elastic communication between the top layer and the bottom layer. Figure 1d demonstrates the morphological characteristics of UBA at different magnifications. The adhesive structure (area 8×8 cm²) was prepared on an indium tin oxide (ITO) coated glass substrate by a one-step self-growth method (the core-shell structure adopts imprint resist and silicone rubber as the rigid material and soft material, respectively, with the pillar supporting layer employing silicone rubber as the soft material) (Fig. 1d-i-ii ). Due to the combined effect of electric field and thermal destabilization, the grown structures show a short-range ordered distribution characteristic (Fig. 1d-iii ). Further observation shows that the rigid core is completely encapsulated by a soft shell with a specific mushroom-like geometry (Fig. 1d-iv ), where the soft shell material resembles a mushroom cap and the rigid material constitutes the structural core. The diameter of the mushroom cap is about 300 μm, and the diameter of the bottom pillar array is about 2 mm. The transparent appearance of the core–shell structure here was achieved by immersing the sample in acetone to dissolve the soft silicone rubber shell, leaving only the rigid core. The final image was generated by overlaying the overall morphology obtained before dissolution with the internal structure revealed after dissolution. In addition, the change in elastic modulus with depth confirms the successful preparation of the rigid-core-soft-shell structure. The effective elastic modulus of 16 MPa increases to 900 MPa as the test probe penetrates from the surface layer of the structure to the bottom region, which corresponds to the values of the rigid and soft materials, respectively (Figure S1 , Supporting Information). In contrast to the core-shell structure at the top (with modulus in the MPa range), the bottom pillar array employs more compliant materials to accommodate large deformations. The overall equivalent stiffness of UBA is approximately 150 kPa (Figure S2 , Supporting Information). Such significant compliance facilitates adaptive conformation to extreme non-planar contours. Figure 1e demonstrates the excellent adaptability of the fabricated UBA to macro-micro-nano cross-scale complex surfaces, including rough surface with micro-scale roughness and uneven surfaces with macro-scale irregularities (Figure S3 , Supporting Information). To the best of our knowledge, such a broad range of adaptation has never been achieved using traditional dry adhesion strategies. The selected adhesion targets here are all commonly used objects in daily life, such as a frosted glass (Ra = 5.68 μm), an A4 paper (Ra = 20.874 μm), a foam plastic (Ra = 4.5 mm), and beaker (curvature = 15 cm). Electrically activated growth mechanism of the proposed adhesive To better understand the growth process of UBA, we proposed a numerical model based on a three-phase flow to describe the rheological behavior of the top bilayer polymer and the bottom single layer polymer under an applied electric field. This model combines the Gauss’s equation for describing the electric field, the Navier-Stokes equations for describing the flow field, and the Cahn-Hilliard equation for characterizing the behavior of air and various fluid materials. Detailed information about the numerical model can be found in Supplementary Text 1 . Figure 2a illustrates the evolution of the top bilayer polymer and bottom single layer polymer under an external electric field, with the corresponding dynamic motion shown in Supplementary Video S1 (Supporting Information). Based on the obtained structural morphology, the forming process can be divided into two stages: Stage I, characterized by vertical growth (i-iii), and Stage II, marked by horizontal growth (iv-vi). Initially, the top bilayer film and the bottom single-layer film are both in a flat state; When a voltage is applied, the electrostatic forces generated at the gas-liquid interface and liquid-liquid interface of the top bilayer film, as well as the gas-liquid interface of the bottom single-layer film, drive the upward growth of the polymer by overcoming viscous forces and surface tension. During this process, the morphology of the top bilayer polymer and bottom single layer polymer transitions from flat to structured. Once the top polymer comes into contact with the upper electrode, it spreads laterally along the electrode surface due to electrowetting effects, forming a mushroom-like cap. Meanwhile, the rigid polymer continues to grow inside the soft polymer, ultimately resulting in a soft-shell–rigid-core geometry. The bottom single-layer film undergoes a similar wetting process after contacting the upper plate, with the difference being that due to gravity inhibition at the millimeter scale, the polymer quickly reaches a saturated contact angle after touching the upper plate, resulting in insignificant lateral spreading and ultimately forming a tapered morphology that is narrower at the top and wider at the bottom. Fig. 2. Analysis of the UBA grown under the action of an electric field. Open in a new tab a Dynamic evolution of the bilayer polymer film under an external electric field obtained via numerical simulations. b Electric field distribution at the air–polymer and polymer-polymer during stage I. c Dynamic evolution of the single polymer film under an external electric field obtained via numerical simulations. d Electric field distribution at the air–polymer during stage I. e The variation trends of the peak electric field intensity and geometric position during the formation of the core-shell structure; f Change of diameter of mushroom-like core-shell structure via evolution time; g The variation of polymer height and maximum electric field intensity with induction time during the formation of the macro-pillar support structure. h Micro-core-shell structures grown at different voltages (500 ~ 800 V) and air gap (30 μm ~ 70 μm); The scale bar is 100 μm. i Macro-pillar structures grown at different voltages (5000 ~ 6000 V) and air gap (2500 μm ~ 3000 μm); The scale bar is 3 mm Figure 2b illustrates the electric field distribution at the air-polymer and polymer-polymer interface of the top bilayer polymer during Stage I. Due to the inhomogeneity of the electric field near the edges of the electrode, these regions become mechanically unstable areas where the polymer begins to grow first. To describe the evolution of the bilayer film, we define the effective electric field strength as Δ E = E max − E min , which corresponds to the effective driving force, where E max and E min represent the maximum and minimum electric field strength at the interface, respectively. Clearly, as the polymer moves upward, Δ E increases, i.e., Δ E 3 > Δ E 2 > Δ E 1 . The evolution of Δ E at the polymer-polymer interface follows a similar trend to that at the polymer-air interface. Thus, the polymer-polymer interface also grows from the edges of the plates toward the center, ultimately forming a core-shell geometry. Figure 2c depicts the growth evolution process of the bottom macro-pillar support structure, driven by the dielectric constant difference at the air-polymer interface, which similarly consists of a vertical growth stage and a horizontal growth stage. It is worth noting that even when the model scale is extended to the millimeter level, the magnitude of the electric field intensity at the air-polymer interface remains the key factor determining whether polymer rheology can occur. After thermal disturbances at the air-polymer interface are amplified, the spatial electric field distribution becomes modulated by the flow field as the polymer morphology changes (Fig. 2d ). This leads to a mutual feedback between the electric and flow fields—similar to that observed at the micro/nano scale—promoting accelerated polymer growth. Figure 2e illustrates the variation trends of the peak electric field intensity and geometric position during the formation of the core-shell structure. In the initial stage (0 ~ 1.5 ms), the electric field intensities at both the air-polymer and polymer-polymer interfaces remain below 0.5 × 10⁶ V/m. At this point, the Maxwell stress has not yet exceeded the surface tension threshold, and the interfaces remain in a thermally perturbed state with slow height growth. Due to the more pronounced dielectric difference, the perturbation amplitude at the air-polymer interface is higher than that at the polymer-polymer interface. As thermal disturbances gradually intensify, the bilayer polymer overcomes surface tension and viscous resistance, leading to rapid upward growth (1.5 ~ 2.5 ms). During this stage, the electric force acting on the bottom polymer is also positively influenced by the evolving morphology of the top polymer. When the upper polymer contacts the plate, the wetting stage begins (2.5 ~ 3.0 ms), during which the electric field strength at the air-polymer interface gradually decreases, and the height reaches saturation. Meanwhile, the bottom polymer continues vertical growth, but its growth rate slows as the increase in effective electric field intensity diminishes. During wetting, the diameter of the mushroom-shaped cap is closely related to the lateral flow velocity of the top polymer. Since the lateral flow continuously decreases until the liquid-solid-gas contact angle reaches saturation, the rate of change in the cap diameter first increases and then gradually slows (Fig. 2f ). Figure 2g depicts the variation of polymer height and maximum electric field intensity with induction time during the formation of the macro-pillar support structure. In the thermal disturbance enhancement stage, gravity modifies the required electric field strength for driving polymer rheology and increases the most unstable wavelength of the polymer under the electric field, thereby influencing the final morphology of the pillar structure. During the growth and formation stage, the vertical height of the polymer and the electric field intensity at the wave peak rapidly increase over time due to the synergistic positive feedback between the flow field and electric field. The growth behavior is affected by the electric field at the fluidic interface; thus, the periodicity of the grown structure can be controlled by adjusting the voltage (Fig. 2h ). For the external voltage, it affects the growing process via the electrically driving force. Upon increasing the voltage from 500 to 1000 V, the periodic length of the structure is decreased accordingly, while the structural diameter is increased and the growth rate is accelerated. In addition to voltage, the air gap also influences the formation characteristics of the structure. When the air gap decreases, on one hand, the electric field intensity at the polymer/air interface increases, leading to a reduction in the amplified thermal perturbation wavelength and resulting in denser micro-nano structures. Furthermore, this enhanced electric field strength significantly increases the electrostatic driving force, thereby accelerating the growth rate of the polymer pillars during the initial rising phase (Fig. S4 , Supporting information). Although a thicker air gap helps mitigate the risk of electrofusion, it also weakens the structure’s modulation effect on the electric field, leading to sparser structures or even preventing them from entering the growth and formation stage. Similarly, voltage and air gap also influence the structural morphology of the macroscopic pillar supports, as shown in Fig. 2i . As the voltage increases, the diameter of the pillars decreases and their arrangement becomes denser, accelerating growth while reducing localized bending stiffness to improve structural flexibility. Increasing the air gap reduces the pillar diameter and increases the spacing between them, thereby slowing the growth rate (Fig. S5 , Supporting information). It is worth noting that the vertical flow process of the macroscopic pillar supports is more sensitive to changes in air gap and voltage parameters compared to micro-nano structures, both low voltage and high air gap can easily hinder the vertical flow of the polymer film. To experimentally validate fabrication repeatability, we fabricated three independent UBA samples using identical process parameters (Supporting information, Fig. S6 ). SEM images reveal highly consistent mushroom-shaped microstructures across all three samples, quantitative adhesion testing further confirms excellent batch-to-batch consistency, demonstrating robust process reliability. To rigorously validate the lateral uniformity over large areas, we systematically characterized the morphology and adhesion performance across different regions of an 8×8 cm² UBA sample (Supporting information, Figs. S7 and S8 ). The results reveal highly consistent mushroom-shaped microstructures with uniform tip diameters and pillar heights, resulting in uniform macroscopic adhesion performance across the entire surface. This high uniformity stems from the parallel plate electrode configuration that generates a homogeneous electric field distribution, ensuring synchronized rheological growth and consistent polymer flow across the entire substrate during the one-step fabrication process. Adhesion enhancement mechanism of the grown adhesive structures To reveal the adhesion enhancement mechanism of UBA on macro-micro-nano cross-cale complex surfaces, we developed an adhesion model based on cohesive zone, detailed information provided in the Supplementary Text 2 . The entire contact-separation process can be seen in Supplementary Video S2 (Supporting Information). First, the contact-separation processes between core-shell structure and normal homogeneous structures on rough surfaces were compared. During the contact phase, the soft shell enables significant deformation of the mushroom cap in the core-shell adhesive structure, and the presence of the rigid core restricts the deformation primarily to the horizontal direction (Fig. S9 , Supporting information). Meanwhile, the stress at the soft shell can be rapidly transmitted to the core layer, reducing stress concentration in the contact area between the adhesives and rough surface, thereby increasing the effective contact area compared to the homogeneous structure (Fig. 3a ). In the pull-off phase, owing to the excellent compliance of the soft shell and the minimal compressive strain in the rigid-core region, the rebound process of compressive strain in the core-shell adhesive structure is more gradual compared to the homogeneous adhesive structure. As a result, partial adhesive contact in the valleys of the rough surface is preserved. Additionally, the interfacial contact stress of the core-shell structure at pull-off moment is more evenly distributed than that of the homogeneous structure (Fig. 3b ), which effectively suppresses crack propagation and enhances adhesion. The simulation results demonstrate that, the adhesive force of the core-shell structure can be increased by approximately 2 times compared to the homogeneous structure under the same preload (Fig. 3c ). Fig. 3. Adhesion enhancement mechanism of the grown UBA on macro-micro-nano cross-scale complex surfaces. Open in a new tab a Evolution of the contact line for core-shell adhesive structure and normal adhesive structure as a function of the process time. b Work of attachment/detachment as a function of the processing time for core-shell adhesive structure and normal adhesive structure. c Adhesive force as a function of the processing time for core-shell adhesive structure and normal adhesive structure. d Dynamic behavior of the UBA structure, and normal adhesive structure on misalignment surfaces when approaching, contacting, and separating from the target surface; e Evolution of the contact line for different structures as a function of the process time. f Work of attachment/detachment as a function of the processing time for different structures. g Adhesive force as a function of the processing time for different structures. h Effect of intermediate layer thickness on adhesion force; i Stress at the interface under same pull-off force between the adhesive structure and the target surface under different intermediate layer thickness. j Stress at the interface under same pull-off force between the adhesive structure and the target surface under different intermediate layer stiffness On the basis of the adaptability of micro-scale core-shell structures to rough surfaces, another key factor in the ability of multi-scale adhesion structures to conform to cross-scale complex surfaces lies in the adaptability of the bottom pillar-arrays layer to macroscopic uneven surfaces. It should be noted that the simulations presented in Fig. 3A–C focus solely on the contact and separation behavior between the top micro-scale core–shell (or homogeneous) structure and a rough surface, where the bottom pillar array is not included. This configuration allows the analysis to isolate the role of the core–shell design on rough-surface adhesion. In contrast, the simulations in panels Fig. 3E–G are designed to evaluate the contribution of the bottom pillar array under macroscopic angular mismatch, corresponding to the misoriented surface scenario illustrated in Fig. 3D . For these simulations, the top core–shell layer is simplified as a cohesive zone layer to concentrate on the mechanical role of the bottom compliant pillars and the intermediate rigid layer. Here, we used angular error to represent macroscopic irregular topography and simulated the contact-separation process of UBA and ordinary structures under angular error, as shown in Fig. 3d . The entire contact-separation process can be seen in Supplementary Video S3 (Supporting Information). During the pressing stage, the macro-pillar support layer exhibits a contact stress that decreases from left to right (Figure S10 , Supporting information). As the deformation of the left region gradually increases, the intermediate layer rotates, enabling the adhesion layer to achieve conformal contact with the inclined surface. In contrast, conventional structures, due to their higher equivalent stiffness compared to UBA structures, establish only partial contact under the same preload (Fig. 3e ). During the tensile phase, the compressive strain accumulated in the pillar support layer gradually recovers, resulting in higher tensile stress on the right side of the adhesion interface than on the left (Figure S11 , Supporting information). This asymmetric stress distribution promotes a right-side peeling tendency in the interface. Notably, conventional adhesive structures rapidly undergo interfacial peeling and complete separation, whereas multiscale adhesive structures suppress crack propagation through stress equalization enabled by the intermediate rigid layer, favoring high-strength adhesion. Figure 3f illustrates the external work done during the entire contact-separation process for both structures. The significantly greater work exhibited by the multiscale design demonstrates its ability to generate higher fracture energy dissipation during interfacial detachment, thereby enhancing overall adhesion performance. The simulation results demonstrate that, under the same preload, the adhesive force of the multi-scale structure can be increased over 10 times compared to the conventional structure (Fig. 3g ). In addition to the pillar array enhancing interface adaptability through its own deformation, as mentioned earlier, the intermediate layer plays a crucial role in flattening interfacial stresses. In the manufacturing process of multiscale adhesive structures, the intermediate layer simultaneously serves as the bottom conductive plate of the core-shell structure and the top conductive plate of the macroscopic micropillar array, ensuring integrated fabrication of the multilayer structure. Thus, the overall multi-scale structure exhibits a soft-rigid-soft gradient from top to bottom. This design offers dual advantages: During contact, the rigid middle layer tends to rotate holistically as the micropillar array compresses, enabling full conformity between the adhesive layer and inclined surfaces. During detachment, the rigid middle layer effectively mitigates stress concentration at the interface compared to soft layers, thereby enhancing interfacial fracture strength and adhesion performance (Fig. 3h ). Furthermore, we investigated how intermediate layer thickness influences adhesive properties (Fig. 3i ). Adhesive force under angular misalignment increases with intermediate layer thickness, though the enhancement rate gradually diminishes. When thickness reaches 1000-1500 μm, adhesive performance stabilizes. This trend originates from the layer’s equivalent stiffness: Thinner layers with lower stiffness deform more easily during stretching, leading to pronounced interfacial stress concentration (Fig. 3j ). Increasing thickness elevates equivalent stiffness, flattening contact stresses across the interface, which effectively suppresses crack propagation and improves adhesion capacity. Adhesion performance on arbitrary unknown surfaces To characterize the adhesion performance of UBA, we conducted adhesion force tests on micro-rough surfaces and macro-irregular surfaces using three types of adhesive structures: (i) homogeneous structure, a single-layer single-material control; (ii) core–shell structure, consisting only of the top mushroom-shaped core–shell array without the bottom support layer; and (iii) UBA, the complete three-layer architecture integrating top core–shell array, intermediate rigid layer, and bottom pillar array. First, sandpapers with different roughness levels (1000-grit, 1500-grit, 2000-grit) were employed as target substrates to evaluate the adhesion performance of various adhesion structures, as shown in Fig. 4a . The sandpaper specimens measured 2 cm × 2 cm in size, and their surface profiles, including the arithmetic mean roughness (Ra), defined as the arithmetic average of the absolute deviations from the mean line, and the maximum height roughness (Rz), defined as the average of the maximum peak-to-valley heights over five sampling lengths, were characterized using a laser confocal microscope. Figure 4b illustrates the variation in adhesive force with preload for different adhesive structures on 1500-grit sandpaper. It can be observed that the homogeneous structure exhibits adhesion forces below 2 kPa due to its inability to establish effective contact with the rough surface. The core-shell structure demonstrates improved adhesion strength compared to the homogeneous structure, attributed to the stiffness modulation effect of its soft shell and rigid core. The UBA benefits from the dual reinforcement of pillar supports and the core-shell configuration, which not only achieves effective contact with surface roughness but also enhances interfacial conformity through the compliant deformation enabled by the micropillars, leading to further adhesion performance improvement over the core-shell structure. Notably, R a exerts a greater influence on adhesion performance than R z . As R a increases, the adhesion performance of all structures declines (Fig. 4c ), though the UBA exhibits the smallest reduction. It is noteworthy that, in addition to the enhanced adhesion performance on rough surfaces, multiscale adhesive structures still maintain decent performance on smooth surfaces, slightly outperforming conventional core-shell structures and homogeneous structures (Supporting Information, Figure S12 ). Here, we introduce an enhancement factor, defined as the multiple of adhesion performance improvement of the multi-scale adhesive structure relative to conventional homogeneous structures. When R a reaches 15 μm (1000-grit), the multi-scale adhesive structure achieves an enhancement factor of 12, exceeding one order of magnitude. The repeatability of the fabricated UBA is also demonstrated, where its adhesion force remains unchanged after 1000 cycles, and the mushroom-shaped microstructures remains intact without observable material wear, surface damage, or plastic deformation before and after cycling (Supporting Information, Figure S13 ). Fig. 4. Adhesion of the grown UBA structures on diverse macro-micro-nano complex surfaces. Open in a new tab a Target rough surfaces used in the experiments, i.e., sandpaper with different roughness. b Variation in the adhesion strength as a function of the preload force for the tested samples. c Adhesion strength and enhancement factor of the three samples on sandpaper; d Variation in the adhesion strength as a function of the preload force under 0.5°; e Variation in the adhesion strength as a function of the preload force under 2°; ( f ) Adhesion strength and enhancement factor of the three samples under different angle error; g Variation in the adhesion strength as a function of the preload force for the PMMA plater; h Variation in the adhesion strength as a function of the preload force for the foam; i Comparison of the results obtained in this study with those reported by previous works on target surfaces with roughness ranging from the micro-nanoscale to the macroscale In addition to rough surfaces, we have also tested the adhesion performance of the different adhesive structure on macro-scale non-flat surfaces. Since macro-scale uneven contours can be inherently deconstructed into combinations of geometric features with varying angular deviations, angularly mismatched surfaces were employed for testing. When the angular mismatch was 0.5°, The adhesion strength of all three structures decreases compared to the parallel state, demonstrating that even minor angular misalignment can impair adhesion performance. The multi-scale adhesive structure rapidly reached saturation adhesion force under minimal preload, achieving final adhesion strength comparable to that of the core-shell structure (Fig. 4d ). At a 2°angular mismatch, all three structures exhibited significant adhesion reduction, with the multi-scale adhesive structure showing only a 20% decline in performance, demonstrating superior adaptability (Fig. 4e ). As the angular mismatch further increased, the enhancement factor of the multi-scale structure progressively amplified, reaching up to over 20-fold improvement (Fig. 4f ). The remarkable performance under angular misalignment stems primarily from the compressive compliance of the bottom micropillar array of the multiscale adhesive structure, which adapts to inclined profiles of target surfaces, thereby establishing adaptive contact (Supporting Information, Fig. S14 ). To further validate the adhesion performance of UBA on macroscopic irregular surfaces, we selected textured PMMA sheet and natural polyethylene foam - two target surfaces with typical spherical array characteristics - for comparative testing of normal adhesion forces between UBA structures and homogeneous structures (Supporting Information, Fig. S15 ). The test results (Fig. 4g-h ) revealed that with increasing preload, the adhesive structure exhibited a significant nonlinear trend on the polyethylene foam surface, where adhesion force rapidly reached saturation and remained constant regardless of further preload increases. Conversely, a linear increasing trend with preload pressure was observed on the textured PMMA sheet. These distinct trends originate from the different stiffness characteristics of the two surfaces: The compliant nature of polyethylene foam enables effective enlargement of real contact area through adaptive deformation during contact, thereby accelerating adhesion force saturation. In contrast, geometric constraints from the rigid textured PMMA sheet result in persistent unclosed regions at the contact interface, hindering complete adhesion saturation. Despite these differing trends, the multi-scale adhesive structure demonstrated remarkable adhesion enhancement in both cases, achieving nearly an order of magnitude improvement compared to homogeneous structures. Since the adhesive structure is subjected to shear forces during grasping by a multi-fingered dexterous hand, its tangential adhesion performance was also characterized (Supporting Information, Figure S16 ). The results indicate that its tangential adhesion performance is significantly higher than its normal adhesion performance, which is consistent with the general behavior of current adhesive materials 45 . The stable tangential adhesion performance strongly supports the stable operation of dexterous robotic hands. To illustrate the superior adhesion of the grown UBA on cross-scale surfaces, we compare the adhesive strength of our work with those of other typical adhesive structures, such as homogenous structures 19 , 46 – 49 , composite structures 36 , 41 , 50 , 51 , and hierarchical structures 52 – 56 (Fig. 4i ). It should be noted that due to the absence of standardized descriptors for cross-scale surface morphology, we define feature size parameters. Specifically, for microscale rough surfaces, the feature size is defined as Ra; for macroscale non-planar surfaces, it is defined by Peak-to-valley height of undulating contours, or elevation difference between highest/lowest points under angular misalignment. Conventional adhesive structures have shown to have limited applicability regarding the roughness of the target surface, i.e., the roughness of the target surface is usually smaller than 1 μm, and the adhesive strength is low. The UBA structure, on the other hand, can be employed on surfaces with roughness ranging from the micro-nanoscale ( ~ μm) to the macroscale ( ~ mm) and exhibit an increased adhesive force. Technological perspective Figure 5 demonstrates the exceptional versatility of the proposed UBA—when integrated onto a dexterous multi-finger gripper, enabling stable, damage-free grasping of objects with diverse challenging surface properties (Supporting Information, Figure S17 ). The manipulating process can be seen in Supplementary Video S4 (Supporting Information). It is worth noting that by changing the pull-off method from normal pull-off to edge peeling, the adhesive force of the UBA can be significantly reduced, thereby facilitating object release (Supporting information, Figure S18 ). Although this approach does not achieve the extremely low detachment forces characteristic of anisotropic structures (which utilize angled fibers that easily shear off at specific angles), this level of release control is entirely sufficient for the target application of multi-fingered dexterous hands. Release can be readily accomplished through simple finger opening or tilting motions. Moreover, the bottom pillar arrays of the UBA are adhesively bonded to the robotic finger using high-strength 3 M tape to ensure that the bottom interfacial strength significantly exceeds the top adhesion strength, thereby guaranteeing that de-adhesion always occurs at the core-shell surface rather than through structural detachment from the gripper. Fig. 5. Demonstration of robotic grasping using the proposed UBA structures for objects with diverse challenging surface properties. Open in a new tab a Fragile ultrathin glass with low-stress-sensitive feature; b Heavy wedge lens with non-parallel feature; c Heavy wafer cassette with irregular feature; d Soft big balloon with rough topography For the ultrathin glass (fragile and low-stress-sensitive) fixed on a wafer cassette, traditional posture-dependent grasping struggles to establish reliable contact without risking breakage from excessive force. The UBA structure addresses this via normal adhesion with minimal preload: the bottom pillars’ low stiffness conforms to the glass surface, ensuring uniform stress distribution and avoiding the stress concentration that plagues conventional methods, even when the glass and finger are slightly non-parallel (Fig. 5a ). For the large wedge lens (non-parallel and heavy), the UBA structure firmly adheres to the non-parallel surface via self-adaptation, while the bottom pillars’ elastic deformation effectively mitigates the high rotational torque, enabling stable rotation without sliding—critical for precision optical assembly (Fig. 5b ). For the wafer cassette (irregular and heavy), grasping only a corner with traditional grippers leads to stress-induced deformation or imbalance. The UBA structure overcomes this via the bottom pillars’ adaptive deformation to match the cassette’s irregular contour, combined with the top high adhesion, ensuring reliable lifting and rotation without imbalance—essential for semiconductor manufacturing (Fig. 5c ). For the balloon (soft and rough) with a diameter ( ~ 30 cm) far exceeding the hand size, traditional grasping causes excessive deformation due to the small effective contact area. The bottom pillars deform to accommodate the balloon’s curved surface, and the top core-shell layer forms multi-point micro-contacts on the rough surface, achieving stable picking with minimal diameter change—a capability rarely achievable with conventional rigid grippers under such constraints (Fig. 5d ). Collectively, the gripping results demonstrate the multi-level structure’s unique ability to adapt to cross-scale macro-micro-nano surfaces, resist torque and stress concentration, and enable high-stability, damage-free grasping. These features position it as a innovate solution for advanced robotic applications, from semiconductor wafer handling to precision lens assembly and service robotics, where conventional grasping methods struggle to meet the demands of complex objects. Discussion In summary, we proposed an universal bioinspired dry adhesive for robust adhesion on arbitrary unknown surfaces. Inspired by the stiffness modulation effect from setae-muscle-skeleton of Gecko, the UBA design integrates three functional layers: (i) Top core-shell microstructure utilizing soft-rigid composites to enable gecko-inspired adaptive contact via van der Waals forces; (ii) Bottom micropillar arrays providing muscle-like macro-contour adaptation through elastic deformation; (iii) Central rigid layer serving as a skeletal hub that synergizes multi-scale interactions—ensuring parallel contact establishment, optimizing interface stress distribution, and enabling force transmission across layers. The fabrication process leverages spatially modulated electric fields to drive the rheological growth of multi-layered polymers, enabling simultaneous formation of adhesive structures with precise control over morphology and stiffness gradients. By adjusting parameters such as voltage and air gap, the structural periodicity and mechanical properties of both micro- and macro-scale components can be tailored, offering flexibility unattainable through conventional fabrication methods. Numerical simulations and experimental validations revealed the adhesion enhancement mechanisms of the design. The core-shell structure increases the effective contact area on rough surfaces through localized compliance, while the rigid intermediate layer homogenizes interfacial stresses and suppresses crack propagation during detachment. Compared to homogeneous or single-scale structures, the multi-scale adhesive demonstrated over 10-fold improvement in adhesion strength on macro-irregular surfaces and maintained robust performance across roughness levels spanning nanometers to millimeters. Grasping applications using graded adhesive-based multi-fingered dexterous robot demonstrated stable manipulation of diverse objects—including fragile, heavy, irregularly shaped, rough-textured, and high-torque-loading specimens, endows robots with extensive target adaptability and operational stability unattainable through conventional mechanical clamping actions alone. This work bridges the gap between laboratory-scale bioinspired adhesives and practical engineering applications. The proposed multi-scale adhesive system holds significant potential for advancing technologies requiring reliable interfacial manipulation, such as flexible grippers, climbing robots, and adaptive epidermal electronics. While the current symmetric design prioritizes universal conformability across arbitrary surface orientations, future work will explore asymmetric core-shell geometries or hierarchically slanted pillar arrays to introduce controllable directional anisotropy. Such modifications could enable angle-selective release mechanisms without compromising the essential cross-scale adaptability, thereby expanding UBA’s applicability to scenarios requiring precise manipulation cycles involving rapid attachment and detachment. Methods Materials Unless stated otherwise, solvents and chemicals were obtained commercially and used without further purification. Silicon Rubber (E-630) was obtained from Shenzhen Hongyejie Technology Co., Ltd., serving as the soft polymer of top core-shell structure and bottom pillar arrays layer. Nanoimprint resist (mr-NIL 6000E) was obtained from Suzhou Ruicai Semiconductor Co., Ltd., serving as the rigid polymer of top core-shell structure. Polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) solution (20 wt%, AF1601) was obtained from the Chemours Company (USA), which acts as the dielectric layer coated on the bottom surface of the upper electrode. ITO glass and ITO-coated PET film were obtained from Luoyang Guluo Glass Co., Ltd. (China), which are both acting as electrodes. Fabrication process of UBA structure The integrated manufacturing sequence for concurrent fabrication of the top core-shell structure and bottom pillar array initiated with argon plasma cleaning of conductive surfaces on three electrode plates (top, middle, and bottom) for contaminant removal and surface activation; followed by spin-coating a 20 wt% polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) solution onto the top plate’s conductive side at 3000 rpm, with subsequent heating at 100 °C for 30 minutes to form a chemically inert hydrophobic layer. Simultaneously, on the upper side of the middle plate, a predefined pattern area was bordered by high-temperature polyimide tape, where mr-NIL 6000E nanoimprint resist was spin-coated, prebaked at 160 °C for 10 minutes for solvent evaporation, covered with a fluorosilane-treated hydrophobic glass coverslip, and hot-embossed under 500 kPa pressure for 5 minutes to replicate microstructures; after cooling to room temperature and removing the glass/tape, an oxygen plasma treatment enhanced surface adhesion before spin-coating E630 silicone rubber as the top elastomeric layer. Concurrently, the top side of the bottom plate was spin-coated with identical E630 silicone rubber, with rotational speed and duration controlled to achieve the target pillar height. Post-coating, a sandwich assembly was constructed: the top plate (PTFE layer facing down) was aligned onto a 100 μm-thick annular polyimide dielectric spacer, beneath which the middle plate was positioned (mr-NIL 6000E/E630 bilayer) with precise parallelism; a 3 mm air gap separated the middle and bottom plates for pillar growth (E630 support layer). The entire setup was transferred to a programmable oven stabilized at 90 °C, and the top plate and middle plate were applied voltage at 800 V to drive directional rheology of the bilayer forming core-shell encapsulation; the middle plate and bottom plate were applied voltage at 5000 V, inducing growth of single-layer polymer into pillars arrays. The synchronized process maintained isothermal and isoelectric conditions for 30 minutes to ensure complete curing, followed by 10-minute natural cooling for stress relief before disassembling the plates, yielding simultaneous formation of multi-level adhesive structures. Fabrication of the homogeneous adhesive structure First, a double-sided exposure process was used to prepare a mold of adhesive structure with 25 mm × 25 mm, and then PUA polymer was poured on the surface of the mold, placed in a vacuum chamber for 10 mins, and then spin-coated at a speed of 2000 r/min for 40 s. Subsequently, a block of silicone rubber with 25 mm ×25 mm × 4 mm was placed on the uncured PUA surface, and placed in a 90 °C oven for 1 hour to solidify the PUA. Finally, demolding to obtain homogeneous soft adhesives. Structures characterization The microstructure of the adhesive material was observed by scanning electron microscopy (SU8010, Hitachi, Japan). The adhesion force of the material was characterized by a computer servo pull–pressure test machine (PT–1176, Baoda, China). The topography image of the grown stiffness gradient structure was characterized by SEM and optical microscope. Displacement-controlled nanoindentation tests were performed on the stiffness gradient adhesive structure from tip to base by Nano Indenter (G200, Agilent, USA) equipped with a Berkovich diamond tip (tip radius ~100 nm). Nanoindentation testing using the continuous stiffness method, and the tests were conducted in a vibration-isolated environment (25 ± 0.5 °C, humidity<30%) after 30 min thermal equilibration (drift rate <0.05 nm/s). The tests were implemented at a maximum indentation depth of 50 μm and a loading/unloading rate of 50 μm/s with contact detection threshold of 200 μN. The holding time is 10 s for creep stabilization. The testing results using the Oliver-Pharr method to calculate the modulus of elasticity at different indentation depths. The tensile elastic modulus of soft materials and rigid materials was tested by computer servo pull–pressure test machine (PT–1176, Baoda, China). Adhesion measurement and characterization The adhesion of grown stiffness gradient structures was measured by Load–Pull mode; that is, the probe is first contacted with the sample to generate a certain contact area, and then the reverse movement is performed until complete separation. The maximum tensile force generated before separation was defined as the maximum adhesion force. The size of the flat probe is 3 mm × 3 mm. The adhesive structure was attached on the base and adjusted to be parallel/nonparallel to the probe surface. The testing surface was moved down at a speed of 1 mm/min to contact with the sample and reached a defined preload for maintaining 5 s, then moved up until the testing surface was completely separated from the stiffness gradient structures. Supplementary information supplementary video 2 (4.8MB, mp4) supplementary video 1 (1.9MB, mp4) supplementary video 3 (4.7MB, mp4) supplementary video 4 (8.9MB, mp4) Supporting Information (8.1MB, docx) Acknowledgements This work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation (52405624), and Postdoctoral Innovation Talents Support Program (BX20240281). Author contributions J.S., H.T. and D.W. conceived the idea. H.T., D.W., and T.X. developed the materials and methods for the adhesive material. D.W., R.W., T.X., and J.Z. designed and performed the adhesion measurements. D.W., R.W. and X.C. designed and performed the mechanical performance testing. D.W., H.T., and X.L. analyzed the data. D.W., H.T., and C.W. performed the numerical simulation. J.S. supervised and directed the research. D.W. and H.T. wrote the manuscript. Data availability All data generated or analyzed during this study are included in this Article (and Supplementary Information). 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