Mueller-matrix microscopy of diffuse layers of polyvinyl acetate with digital holographic reconstruction of layer-by-layer depolarization maps

Abstract

A collection of layered maps of the depolarisation due to diffuse layers of polyvinyl acetate are produced using a polarization-holographic Mueller matrix method approach. The topography of maps of the diffuse layers of polyvinyl acetate relates to the scattering multiplicity within the volume and the specific of polycrystalline structure. The overall depolarisation map is a convolution of the effects of these two factors. Through statistical analysis, the dependences of the magnitudes of the first to fourth order statistical moments are determined. These moments characterise the changing distributions of the depolarisation values through the volume of diffuse layers of polyvinyl acetate with different concentration. Dehydrated polyvinyl acetate layers depolarisation maps are characterised by larger average and dispersion, and less skewness and kurtosis, compared to the distributions for the diffuse "dehydrated" layers of polyvinyl acetate. This work demonstrates that a polarization-holographic Mueller matrix method can be applied to the assessment of the 3D morphology of diffuse layers of polyvinyl acetate, with applications in diagnosis – differentiation of the degree of adhesion.