Lillehei Peter T, Kim Jae-Woo, Gibbons Luke J, Park Cheol
Advanced Materials and Processing Branch, NASA Langley Research Center, 6 West Taylor Street, Hampton, VA 23681, USA.
Nanotechnology. 2009 Aug 12;20(32):325708. doi: 10.1088/0957-4484/20/32/325708. Epub 2009 Jul 21.
Quantifying the nature and extent of the dispersion of nanomaterials in polymer matrices is the important first step in understanding the relationship between the nanoscale structure and the bulk scale functional performance of nanocomposites. We present here a methodology for using scanning electron microscope images of nanocomposites taken under high accelerating voltages to quantify four parameters that relate to the dispersion of the nanomaterial. This image analysis methodology is general and applicable to images from other microscopes as well. The analysis performed here was done on representative local areas of six samples to determine the effects of processing conditions, matrix chemistry, and carbon nanotube composition on the level of dispersion. Future work will involve expanding this analysis to rapidly cover larger areas and reducing the data in a manner that is similar to the approach of small angle scattering studies.
量化纳米材料在聚合物基体中的分散性质和程度，是理解纳米复合材料的纳米级结构与宏观功能性能之间关系的重要第一步。我们在此提出一种方法，利用在高加速电压下拍摄的纳米复合材料的扫描电子显微镜图像，来量化与纳米材料分散相关的四个参数。这种图像分析方法具有通用性，也适用于来自其他显微镜的图像。此处进行的分析是在六个样品的代表性局部区域上进行的，以确定加工条件、基体化学性质和碳纳米管组成对分散水平的影响。未来的工作将包括扩展这种分析，以快速覆盖更大的区域，并以类似于小角散射研究的方法减少数据量。
