Published online by Cambridge University Press: 15 February 2011
We report here on the application of the new technique of the X-Ray Surface Forces Apparatus (XSFA) to the study of the smectic liquid crystal 8CB (4-cyano-4′-octylbiphenyl) and a zwitterionic polyisoprene melt. The XSFA allows one to study the structure of fluid films under confinement and flow using intense synchrotron x-ray radiation. The above systems were investigated with the distances between the confining surfaces ranging from 0.4μm to a few tens of microns. Two different kinds of confining surfaces were used leading to different structural behavior of the samples as a function of the confining gap.