ABSTRACT
The process of many important physical and chemical processes can be followed by observing the associated mass changes. The increased interest in using microbalances has resulted, in part, from the rapid progress in scientific instrumentation (Czanderna and Lu 1984). From a current perspective, it is difficult to realise that only thirty years ago, the ranks of experts about the piezoelectric quartz crystal microbalance were limited to those few with the resources and ability to assemble their own instruments. Today, highly sophisticated automatic, microprocessorcontrolled devices are available commercially and satisfy most requirements of scientific and technological investigators. Parallel progress in vacuum science and technology has provided a means of controlling the environment required for many experiments using the QCM (Henry 1996).
