μCT-Based Analysis of the Solid Phase in Foams: Cell Wall Corrugation and other Microscopic Features

This work presents a series of three-dimensional computational methods with the objective of analyzing and quantifying some important structural characteristics in a collection of low-density polyolefin-based foams. First, the solid phase tortuosity, local thickness, and surface curvature, have been determined over the solid phase of the foam. These parameters were used to quantify the presence of wrinkles located at the cell walls of the foams under study. In addition, a novel segmentation technique has been applied to the continuous solid phase. This novel method allows performing a separate analysis of the constituting elements of this phase, that is, cell struts and cell walls. The methodology is based on a solid classification algorithm and evaluates the local topological dissimilarities existing between these elements. Thanks to this method it was possible to perform a separate analysis of curvature, local thickness, and corrugation ratio in the solid constituents that reveals additional differences that were not detected in the first analysis of the continuous structure. The methods developed in this work are applicable to other types of porous materials in fields such as geoscience or biomedicine.