Measurement of human skin moisture via high-frequency spectroscopy.

High-frequency spectroscopy (HFS) is an analytical method that is sensitive to slight changes in the dielectric properties of materials. Since water has high permittivity, HFS can be used to detect changes in water content in materials. In this study, we employed HFS to measure human skin moisture during a water sorption-desorption test. Skin without any treatment showed a resonance peak at approximately 1150 MHz. Furthermore, the peak shifted to lower frequency immediately after the application of water to the skin and gradually returned to its original frequency as time progressed. The resonance frequency obtained via least-squares fitting showed that the applied water remained in the skin after 240 s from the beginning of the measurement. These results illustrated that HFS measurements can monitor the progression of decreasing moisture content in human skin during a water sorption-desorption test.

Monitoring the stability of an emulsion by high-frequency spectroscopy.

High-frequency spectroscopy has been applied to monitoring the stability of oil-in-water emulsions. It was found that stable emulsions showed absorption peaks at around 550 MHz; further, they shifted from lower to higher frequencies with time. The rate of increase of the frequencies was dependent on the amount of emulsifier added. These results show that the stability of emulsions can be monitored by the amount of the frequency shift.

Behavior of bound water in polyethylene oxide studied by DSC and high-frequency spectroscopy.

Measurements of DSC, NMR and high-frequency spectroscopy have been done on PEO-H2O and PEO-H2O-HQ mixed systems. DSC measurements show that water molecules contained in PEO are divided roughly into two species: freezable water and non-freezable water. By 1H-NMR measurements, PEO and H2O protons show an absorption peak around 3.6 ppm and 4.5 ppm, respectively. All the PEO-H2O samples containing H2O show NMR absorption signals, suggesting the existence of movable H2O. Samples with H2O molar ratio over 0.5, show one absorption peak of H2O protons, and more than two peaks of PEO. The results from DSC and NMR measurements show that the bound state of H2O in PEO, as well as the mobility of PEO itself, varies according to the water content in PEO-H2O samples. On the other hand, DSC measurements give the result that PEO-H2O-HQ systems can be considered as homogeneous so long as the content of H2O and/or HQ is not so high. Furthermore, the water molecules in the system exist as bound water. Results of high-frequency spectroscopic measurements for the PEO-H2O and PEO-H2O-HQ systems show good agreement with those of DSC and NMR measurements.

High frequency spectroscopic study of the bound state of water in PEG-H2O system during heating from frozen state.

The bound state of water in PEG (polyethylene glycol)-H(2)O systems was studied by using HFS and DSC methods. Samples with the mixing ratios EO:H(2)O = 1:1 (a) and 1:10 (b), where EO indicates the ethylene oxide units in PEG chain, were heated from frozen state to melt state. Sample (a) gave an HFS peak corresponding to the weakly bound water, while sample (b) gave the peaks of both the bound and free water. DSC measurements gave quite similar patterns to those of HFS measurements, but with additional peaks corresponding to cold crystallization. The difference between the two measurements was reasonably interpreted by considering the origin of the cold crystallization.