The mechanical and chemical information of a poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) film on a microcantilever were simultaneously acquired by photothermal cantilever deflection spectroscopy as a function of ultraviolet (UV) irradiation time. Nanomechanical infrared (IR) spectra from the PMMA-coated microcantilever agreed well with the Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) spectra of PMMA on gold-coated silicon wafer. The decreasing intensities of nanomechanical IR peaks represent chemical as well as mechanical information of UV radiation-induced photodegradation processes in the PMMA which cannot be obtained by a conventional FTIR technique. The observed decrease in the resonance frequency of the microcantilever is related to the change in the Young’s modulus of the PMMA under UV exposure.
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