Quality control of polymeric compounds using terahertz imaging

Frank Rutz; Martin Koch; Shilpa Khare; Martin Moneke

doi:10.1117/12.590301

25 March 2005 Quality control of polymeric compounds using terahertz imaging

Frank Rutz, Martin Koch, Shilpa Khare, Martin Moneke

Proceedings Volume 5727, Terahertz and Gigahertz Electronics and Photonics IV; (2005) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.590301
Event: Integrated Optoelectronic Devices 2005, 2005, San Jose, California, United States

Abstract

Polymers are often mixed with other additives or fillers to yield compounds with modified physical properties. In most cases a homogeneous mixture is desired. Yet, it often remains difficult to verify the degree of homogeneity of the resulting compound especially for nano-scaled fillers. We present initial experiments to evaluate the potential of terahertz (THz) spectroscopy for the quality control of polymeric compounds. We study low-density polyethylene (LDPE) samples which contain titanium dioxide nanospheres with a typical diameter of 270 nm which themselves are coated with even smaller silver nanoparticles with a typical diameter of 20 nm. Images obtained with a standard terahertz time-domain spectrometer show significant inhomogeneities in the compound on a millimeter scale. The imaging results indicate imperfectly mixed material regions. On the other hand, we show that also fluctuations in the sample thickness can lead to inhomogeneous terahertz images. A final conclusion, if the inhomogeneities observed in our LDPE/Ag-TiO2 samples result from variations in the compound composition or from thickness fluctuations, cannot be drawn at this point.

Citation Download Citation

Frank Rutz, Martin Koch, Shilpa Khare, and Martin Moneke "Quality control of polymeric compounds using terahertz imaging", Proc. SPIE 5727, Terahertz and Gigahertz Electronics and Photonics IV, (25 March 2005); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.590301

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