The first section of this work is a review of the literature necessary to understand the objectives of the project; it includes general information about dental adhesive technology as well as adhesion testing, about dentine hybridisation and about the drawbacks of contemporary bonding systems. Several studies revealed excellent immediate and short-term bonding effectiveness of etch-and-rinse adhesives, yet substantial reductions in resindentine bond strength occur after ageing. Degenerative phenomena involve hydrolysis of suboptimally polymerised hydrophilic resin components and degradation of mineral-deprived water-rich resin-sparse collagen matrices by matrix metalloproteinases and cysteine cathepsins.