vulture - 26-11-2005 at 08:11
...or Diffuse Reflectance Infrared Fourier Transform Spectroscopy.
Need to write a paper on this one. Unfortunately, the book that describes it in detail has been borrowed by a prof from the library, so no chance in
hell I'm going to get it.
There's alot of general IR books in the library, so I was wondering if anyone knows an IR book that covers this in some detail or can recommend
one or better, has personal experience with this technique.
I wouldn't have to ask this question in the first place if the library search engine wasn't so crappy 
[Edited on 26-11-2005 by vulture]
sparkgap - 26-11-2005 at 08:29
Seen this?
http://www.nuance.northwestern.edu/KeckII/ftir7.asp
What's the name of the book you were looking for? Maybe somebody's already scanned it and posted it somewhere... 
sparky (~_~)
vulture - 26-11-2005 at 09:52
Seen that, but it's way too superficial to base a report on.
Humecki, Howard J.
Practical guide to infrared microspectroscopy / Ed. by Howard J. Humecki
Practical spectroscopy ; 19
New York (N.Y.): Dekker,
1995
ISBN 0-8247-9449-4
sparkgap - 26-11-2005 at 17:34
NetLibrary apparently has an e-book version here, but the nearby university library here doesn't have access. 
Maybe someone whose library subscribes to this service can get the book?
(edit: found a lot of good stuff on books.google.com, among them the book you want and "Practical Sampling Techniques for Infrared Analysis"
by Coleman. Search around, you might be able to get away with a nice report on DRIFTS with the few pages available on Google. )
sparky (^_^)
[Edited on 27-11-2005 by sparkgap]
Quibbler - 29-11-2005 at 04:29
There are really two concepts here.
Diffuse reflectance AND
Fourier transform IR.
Can't really see the point in diffuse reflectance any real spectroscopist would grind the sample with KBr and make a disc. Sounds like a neat
trick you can publish the same results twice - this time using diffuse reflectance - and throw in a few self citations along the way. Yes you're
right I'm old and jaded The Man has worn me down don't let it happen to you
sparkgap - 29-11-2005 at 04:34
From what I read on the lit., the neat thing about DRIFTS is exactly the fact that there's no need to go through the trouble of making a KBr
pellet/disc. For instance, if you were to do an analysis of a tablet of a suspect drug to check if the *real* A.I. is in there, you can just do DRIFTS
instead of crushing the tablet and reforming it with KBr.
My mathematical point of view on this technique is that the Fourier transform is a must; signals from diffuse reflectance really do tend to be noisy.
I read in a marginal note somewhere that mere tapping of a vial containing a powder for DRIFTS analysis is sufficient to cause noticeable changes in
the results. 
sparky (^_^)
Quibbler - 29-11-2005 at 05:25
Yes I went over the top there. The problem with some of these exotic techniques is you are normally wanting to compare your spectrum with those in the
spectrum libraries to get a match, and those in the libraries are collected in the normal way. I suspect that the technique depends on how far the IR
penitrates the crystals often these reflectance techniques just give you the spectrum of the surface atoms which can be very different to the bulk. Oh
and there's an art to making KBr disc which is why organic chemists use nujol.