Thermal Analysis of Polymers Fundamentals and Applications

This book focuses on the practical aspects of thermal analysis of polymers as an everyday characterization tool in laboratories. It provides some necessary theoretical background, but mainly serves as a guide to performing thermal analysis tests, and interpreting the data thus obtained.

Learn how to take full advantage of a broad range of thermal analysis techniques

Thermal Analysis of Polymers: Fundamentals and Applications emphasizes the practical uses of thermal analysis, enabling readers to take full advantage of its capabilities as a polymer characterization tool in their laboratories. The book offers essential theoretical background; however, it focuses on how to perform a broad range of thermal analysis measurements and tests, with detailed coverage of methods, applications, instrumentation, and calibration. Moreover, it helps readers correctly interpret their results.

This book features a team of authors whose expertise spans all the thermal analysis techniques and applications covered in the book. Their advice is based not only on thorough knowledge of the literature, but also their own hands-on experience working in the lab. Among the topics covered are:

• Differential scanning calorimetry

• Thermogravimetric analysis

• Thermomechanical analysis and thermodilatometry

• Dynamic mechanical analysis

• Dielectric analysis

• Micro- and nano-scale local thermal analysis

Each chapter guides readers through the applications of thermal analysis for polymer char-acterization, with detailed examples that show how to perform each step. References guide readers to the primary literature for further investigation into each topic.

Following this book's step-by-step guidance, chemists and engineers new to thermal analysis techniques, whether in industry, government, or academia, can quickly learn to use them to generate high-quality results. For more experienced researchers, the book enables them to expand their repertoire to include a broader range of sophisticated techniques and applications.

• Presents a solid introduction to thermal analysis, methods, instrumentation, calibration, and application along with the necessary theoretical background.
• Useful to chemists, physicists, materials scientists, and engineers who are new to thermal analysis techniques, and to existing users of thermal analysis who wish expand their experience to new techniques and applications
• Topics covered include Differential Scanning Calorimetry and Differential Thermal Analysis (DSC/DTA), Thermogravimetry, Thermomechanical Analysis and Dilatometry, Dynamic Mechanical Analysis, Micro-Thermal Analysis, Hot Stage Microscopy, and Instrumentation.
• Written by experts in the various areas of thermal analysis
• Relevant and detailed experiments and examples follow each chapter.