General Chemistry 10th Edition

Published by Cengage Learning
ISBN 10: 1-28505-137-8
ISBN 13: 978-1-28505-137-6

Chapter 11 - States of Matter; Liquids and Solids - Questions and Problems - Page 484: 11.125

Answer

Please see the work below.

Work Step by Step

We know that Van der Waals forces exist between two surfaces but these forces are very weak. The toe of a gecko is covered with fine hair and each hair has thousands of split ends. The contact of billion of split ends of hair with the surface results in a large attractive force to hold gecko fast.
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