TY - JOUR
T1 - Facile evaluation of coating thickness on membranes using ATR-FTIR
AU - Bass, Maria
AU - Freger, Viatcheslav
N1 - Funding Information:
The authors acknowledge financial support by the German-Israeli Foundation for Scientific Research and Development (G.I.F.), Grant no. 953-25.10/2007, and the German-Israeli Water Technology Cooperation Program by the Ministry of Science & Technology of Israel and the Federal Ministry of Education and Research of Germany, Grant no. 2394/WT 1202. We are grateful to Prof. Mathias Ulbricht and Mathias Quilitzsch (Universität Duisburg-Essen) and Dr. Moshe Herzberg (Ben-Gurion University) for fruitful discussions. We also thank to Dr. Arkady Bitler for help with MatLab.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2015 Elsevier B.V.
PY - 2015/10/5
Y1 - 2015/10/5
N2 - The study introduces a method for facile evaluation of thicknesses of thin coating layers on substrates based on Attenuated Total Reflection Fourier Transfer Infra-Red (ATR-FTIR) spectroscopy. This approach enables fast and simple evaluation of average thickness of polymeric coatings up to several micrometers thick for a variety of substrates, once the refractive index and extinction coefficient of the coating and substrate materials are independently determined. The method yields average thickness over practically meaningful areas of up to several cm2. It is useful for studying surface-modified or fouled substrates, e.g., separation membranes, and may apply to non-uniform or patchy coatings on rough substrates. Its utility was demonstrated for nano- and ultrafiltration membranes grafted with thin layers of low-fouling polymers. The method was validated by comparing ATR-FTIR thickness to the one independently measured by electron microscopy for well-defined spin-coated NF and UF membrane samples.
AB - The study introduces a method for facile evaluation of thicknesses of thin coating layers on substrates based on Attenuated Total Reflection Fourier Transfer Infra-Red (ATR-FTIR) spectroscopy. This approach enables fast and simple evaluation of average thickness of polymeric coatings up to several micrometers thick for a variety of substrates, once the refractive index and extinction coefficient of the coating and substrate materials are independently determined. The method yields average thickness over practically meaningful areas of up to several cm2. It is useful for studying surface-modified or fouled substrates, e.g., separation membranes, and may apply to non-uniform or patchy coatings on rough substrates. Its utility was demonstrated for nano- and ultrafiltration membranes grafted with thin layers of low-fouling polymers. The method was validated by comparing ATR-FTIR thickness to the one independently measured by electron microscopy for well-defined spin-coated NF and UF membrane samples.
KW - ATR-FTIR spectroscopy
KW - Coating thickness measurement
KW - Fouled membranes
KW - Surface modification
KW - Surface-grafted substrates
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84934973130&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.memsci.2015.05.059
DO - 10.1016/j.memsci.2015.05.059
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84934973130
SN - 0376-7388
VL - 492
SP - 348
EP - 354
JO - Journal of Membrane Science
JF - Journal of Membrane Science
ER -