Surface Energy Analyzers

Surface Energy Analyzer (SEA) is a new second generation Inverse Gas Chromatography (IGC)instrument. The SEA is an advanced instrumentation for the characterisation of particulates, fibres and thin-films. It opens up a whole new world of sorption solutions. These are some of the facilities that the Surface energy anlayzer provides:

Surface Energetics Surface Energy Heterogeneity Mapping Unrivalled Accuracy Heats of Sorption Fully Automated Sorption Isotherms Humidity Control Phase Transitions Sample Preconditioning Diffusion Kinetics Wide Temperature Range

Key properties measured by the SEA include surface energy acid-base parameters, energetic heterogeneity mapping, batch-to-batch variations in surface chemistry, glass transition temperatures, adhesion – cohesion thermodynamics, and solubility parameters and crosslink density.

How does the Surface Energy Anlayzer (SEA) work? The SEA is based on Inverse Gas Chromatography (IGC) methodology and is a gas phase technique for characterising surface and bulk properties of solid materials. The principles of IGC are very simple, being the reverse of a conventional gas chromatographic (GC) experiment. A cylindrical column is uniformly packed with the solid material of interest, typically a powder, fibre or film. A pulse or constant concentration of gas is then injected down the column at a fixed carrier gas flow rate , and the time taken for the pulse or concentration front to elute down the column is measured by a detector. A series of IGC measurements with different gas phase probe molecules then allows access to a wide range of phyisco-chemical properties of the solid sample.