The ATMCP offers many advanced techniques to characterize your materials over a broad temperature range (starting as low as -150°C). The instruments we have are:
DSC is a technique that allows to determine the thermal processes at play in a sample, including phase transitions, reaction kinetics, and many other properties. Our system can be run from -150°C up to 500°C, at rate of up to 300K/min (heating) or 50K/min (cooling). We can also perform modulated DSC analysis to separate kinetic from reversible processes.
DMA is a powerful technique that allows to determine the rheological behavior of a sample with respect to temperature and frequency. This technique is used to characterize loss and storage moduli of materials, and tan δ curves from 0.001 Hz up to 1 000 Hz, at temperature from -150°C up to 500°C. We also have a great number of geometries/clamps to measure different type of samples, from soft gel to hard to powder materials.
Achieving very high frequency DMA on a sample is useful as it allows the direct determination of rheological behavior at very high frequency, which used to be obtained only by extrapolation with William-Landau-Ferrel (WLF) or Adams-Gibbs (AG) models (also refered to as the time-temperature superposition model).This technique is used to characterize loss and storage moduli of materials, and tan δ curves from 100 Hz up to 10 000 Hz with better accuracy than extrapolation ever could achieve.
TMA allows the characterization of thermal expansion coefficient of a sample and can also characterize creep/relaxation, stress/strain behavior. The instrument we have can perform measurements from -150°C up to 500°C, and is equipped with a variety of probes for different sample types and different analysis.
LFA allows the measurement of thermal diffusivity and conductivity of a sample. The instrument we have (TA Instruments DXF 200+) allows measurements from -175°C up to 200°C and is designed for polymer-based materials.
DDS allows the determination of the rheological behavior of a sample by looking at the characteristic time of the relaxation process after applying an alternating electric field. The analysis displays an imaginary (capacitive) component and a real (resistive) component, which can be used to draw the tan δ curve. At higher frequencies, it gives the time for the motion of polymer chains. The instrument can also be used to measure conductivities (ionic and electric) using various models.
Samples need to be prepared prior to most measurements with the previously mentionned instruments. The platform is equipped with an analytical balances (± 0.1 mg), a semi-microbalance (± 0.01 mg), and a heating press (up to 500°C and pressure of up to 12 tons) to prepare samples. Should any specific preparations be performed, we also have access to other tools to do so.