Micro Contaminants Analysis with Infrared Microscope Micromanipulator System

Introduction

Infrared microscopes are widely employed for the analysis of micro items or micro areas. Depending on sample conditions and analysis objectives, transmission or reflectance methods can be selected. In particular, the specular reflectance and attenuated total reflectance (ATR) methods, variations of the reflectance method, are capable of non-destructive analysis without sample pretreatment. However, with these methods, applicable samples are restricted because the measurement is affected by the surface conditions or thickness of the sample, as well as by the substrate. In contrast, transmission methods can be applied to a wider range of samples and can achieve higher- sensitivity measurements on account of the small loss of the light intensity. However, in most cases, pretreatment procedures such as sampling the target object are required. The Infrared Microscope Micromanipulator System introduced in this Application News allows all processes from sample observation to sampling and analysis to be conducted with a single microscope.

June 23, 2004 GMT