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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 July 2020
Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) Microspectroscopy is a powerful method to examine and characterize domains down to areas of 10х10 μm2. Spatial concentration maps of chemical species were obtained using apertures to sequentially examine areas on a grid and obtain a map by plotting average spectral absorbance data obtained from each of the areas. New Focal Plane Array (FPA) detectors, composed of a large number (in our case, 64х64) of small detectors arranged in a grid pattern, allow simultaneous collection of infrared radiation at many points from a large spatial region (500х500 μm2 in our case). This allows for a rapid acquisition of chemically specific images from a given area and the examination of several real-time processes. This technique has found a wide variety of applications in multi-phase polymers including polymer laminates, phase separated polymer composites, semi-crystalline polymers and blends, and solvent diffusion into polymers have been the main areas of interest in non-biological IR studies using FPA detection. We present some of the recent work in our group on various multi-phase polymer systems using FPA based infrared spectroscopy.