Chemical Structure of EVA Films Obtained by Pulsed Electron Beam and Pulse Laser Ablation

Poly(ethylene-co-vinyl acetate) (EVA) films were deposited for the first time using physical methods. The chemical structure of the films obtained using two techniques, pulsed electron beam deposition (PED) and pulsed laser deposition (PLD), was studied by attenuated total reflection Fourier infrared spectroscopy (ATR-FTIR) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). Whilst significant molecular degradation of the EVA films was observed for the PLD method, the original macromolecular structure was only partially degraded when the PED technique was used, emphasizing the superiority of the PED method over PLD for structurally complex polymers such as EVA. Optical and scanning electron microscopic observations revealed compact and smooth EVA films deposited by pulsed electron beam ablation as opposed to heterogeneous films with many different sized particulates obtained by PLD.