Studies of interfacial behavior, surface morphology and tertiary structures of polysiloxane blends and copolymers at the air/water interface and their use as model systems to study ion formation mechanisms in secondary ion mass spectrometry

Polymer monolayers spread at the air/water interface have been studied both for the understanding of the molecular level details of structure and for understanding of technological applications of the ultrathin polymer layers. In this study, the surface behavior of polysiloxane polymers, along with their behavior as components in blends and a copolymer was investigated at the air/water interface using the Langmuir balance technique. Further, their Langmuir-Blodgett (LB) films transferred at the different surface pressures were analyzed using the various surface-sensitive techniques including time of flight secondary ion mass spectrometry (TOF SIMS), reflection-absorption Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (RAFTIR) and atomic force microscopy (AFM).;This thesis is divided into three parts: the first work examines the tertiary structure of Langmuir-Blodgett (LB) film of poly(methylphenylsiloxane) (PMPhS) transferred at the different surface pressures using RAFTIR and TOF SIMS, part two explores the interfacial behavior and tertiary structure of poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS) in blends and a copolymer system of polystyrene (PS)/PDMS through AFM and TOF-SIMS, and finally, the characteristic secondary ion mass spectrometric fragmentation of PDMS and PMPhS monolayer films by is compared for bombardment with monoatomic and polyatomic primary ions in TOF SIMS.