Abstract
Principles of characterization of polymer surface structure and surface molecular motion have been presented. Also, the characterization techniques of surface molecular motion of polymeric solids have been summarized. Temperature dependent X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (TDXPS) was utilized for the characterization of surface molecular motion of symmetric diblock copolymers. The activation of surface molecular motion at the surface was also confirmed by TDXPS. Dynamic secondary ion mass spectroscopy (DSIMS) was employed for the depth profiling of the chemical composition of end-labelled polystyrene (PS) film and the end group segregation at the air/solid PS interface was verified by DSIMS. Scanning viscoelasticity microscopy (SVM) was developed for studying of the surface mechanical properties of polymeric solids. It was revealed that the molecular motion at the surface of glassy polystyrene (PS) was fairly activated compared with that of bulk one due to the surface segregation of chain end groups. These results indicate that surface glass transition temperature is depressed due to the increase in free volume near surface region. The two-dimensional mapping of the surface mechanical properties for the polymer blend ultrathin films was carried out on a nanometer scale by using SVM.
