Nanomechanical properties of human hair using AFM, nanoindentation, SEM and EDX

Abstract

Human hair is a natural fiber which is having a composite structure. The nanomechanical properties of human hair can be altered in pathological conditions, and small scale characterization of human hair can be helpful to estimate these changes of material and compositional properties. The paper presents the study of small scale properties of human hair including surface roughness, elastic modulus, hardness, surface morphology, sulphur content using Atomic force microscopy, nanoindentation, scanning electron microscopy and energy dispersive x-ray spectroscopy. The observations on studying both the control and thyroid hair depicted increase roughness, decreased material properties, decreased sulphur content and altered surface morphology in thyroid group as compared to control hair.