AVS 59th Annual International Symposium and Exhibition
    Applied Surface Science Wednesday Sessions
       Session AS+NS+SS+TF-WeA

Paper AS+NS+SS+TF-WeA9
Correlating Structure and Chemistry – A Multitechnique Study using Light Microscopy (LM), SEM and XPS

Wednesday, October 31, 2012, 4:40 pm, Room 20

Session: 3D Imaging & Nanochemical Analysis - Part 2 (2:00-3:20 pm)/ Advanced Data Analysis and Instrument Control (4:00-6:00 pm)
Presenter: M.L. Pacholski, The Dow Chemical Company
Authors: M.L. Pacholski, The Dow Chemical Company
P.Y. Eastman, The Dow Chemical Company
Correspondent: Click to Email
Understanding the distribution of carbon-rich chemistries on organic substrates can be very difficult, particularly when the substrates are not uniform, such as cellulose fibers. Recently we have been challenged to measure the distribution of an olefin polymer on a fibrous cellulose sheet. In order to verify that measured chemical distributions were definitively from polymer, as well as to understand the morphology of the deposited polymer, it was highly desired to study identical areas using SEM and other imaging techniques. Although several chemical imaging methods were investigated, it became apparent that XPS imaging was the only chemical technique capable of obtaining distributions over the desired fields of view (1 mm-3 mm). Registry of the SEM images with XPS images proved to be difficult since many of the traditional registry methods, such as marking with ink or gluing markers to the surface are ill-suited to absorbent cellulose. The first step was to align relatively low magnification light microscope images from a stereoscope with optical images captured directly in the XPS instrument. These images were then used as a “bridge” to align the higher magnification SEM and XPS images. With this method, deposited polymer and chemical information were correlated with high spatial accuracy. Composite images showing the chemical information as colored overlays on the SEM images were generated to clearly display the correlation.