Evaluating Mechanical Properties of Polymers at the Nanoscale Level via Atomic Force Microscopy–Infrared Spectroscopy

摘要： Characterization and optimization of packaging materials requires accessing their composition with nanometric precision. A possible solution comes from AFM-IR, a technique based on the coupling of Atomic Force Microscope and InfraRed spectroscopy, capable to acquire IR spectra with a spatial resolution overpassing by far the limit of infrared spectroscopy. Differentiating polyolefins – typical component of packaging films – is complicated by the large similarity in the infrared response of this class of materials. Here, we propose a method to improve domains differentiation based on the analysis of IR spectra and viscoelastic properties, extracted via a routine similar to that employed in contact-resonance AFM.