Effect of Sputter Coating on the Observation of Polymeric Membrane Structure

以電子顯微鏡觀察高分子膜結構時，需要在膜材上鍍上一層金屬。本研究利用原子力顯微鏡來探討濺鍍前後高分子膜結構的差異，藉以評估濺鍍程序是否會對高分子膜結構的觀察產生影響。實驗結果顯示，濺鍍金屬層是由許多微小金屬顆粒所構成，而金屬顆粒的大小與高分子膜材粒狀結構的大小差不多（20 nm），因此濺鍍程序會對高分子膜中粒狀結構的觀察產生干擾。本研究之結果顯示:利用電子顯微鏡觀察高分子膜的細微結構（如粒狀結構）時，必須十分小心，因為金屬濺鍍可能會改變這些細微結構。

關鍵字

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並列摘要

In the present work, the effect of sputter coating, a step for preparing SEM specimen, on the observation of polymeric membrane structure was investigated by using AFM to examine the difference in membrane structure before and after sputter coating. It was observed that the sputtering process can produce coatings made up of distinguished particles.The size of the particles is on the same order of that of nodules (20nm), which are believed by many as a basic structure of polymeric membranes. Hence, the sputter coating could affect the judgement if nodules exits in a system and influence the determination of the size of nodules. In addition, it was found that, for three PMMA membranes studied in this work, the surface is not uniform but consists of a lot of protrusions, which is believed to be aggregations of polymer (nodules). For membrane surfaces with small crevices among protrusions, it seems that the protrusions receive more coatings than the crevices during coating process, resulting in larger surface protrusions after sputter coating. On the other hand, for membrane surfaces with large crevices among protrusions, the crevices would be filled with the coating material, resulting in smaller crevices after sputter coating. The results indicate that one should be careful in using SEM to investigate the fine polymeric structure such as nodules because the coating process could influence the fine structure.

並列關鍵字

Polymeric Membrane Structure ； Sputter Coating ； SEM ； AFM ； Nodule

國際替代計量

Effect of Sputter Coating on the Observation of Polymeric Membrane Structure

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