Patent ID: 8378015

Claim:
A hot melt adhesive comprising from about 18 to about 40 wt %, based on the total weight of the adhesive, of a hyper-branched polystyrene-polybutadiene-polystyrene (SBS) block copolymer having (i) at least about 13 arms and (ii) a di-block percentage of from about 25% to about 75% and a tackifying resin, wherein said hyper-branched SBS is characterized in having a ratio between light-scattering molecular weight (of non-di-block polymer) and GPC molecular weight (of non-di-block polymer) greater than 1.4 and having ratio between light scattering molecular weight molecular weight (of non-di-block polymer) and light scattering molecular weight molecular weight (of di-block polymer) greater than 5, and wherein the weight average molecular weight of each arm of the hyper-branched SBS block copolymer is less than about 100,000 wherein said hot melt adhesive application temperature ranges from about 250° F. to about 325° F. and said hot melt adhesive shear adhesion failure temperature is at least 10° F. higher than a hot melt adhesive without the hyper-branched SBS.