pyDAMPF: a Python package for modeling mechanical properties of hygroscopic materials under interaction with a nanoprobe

Abstract

pyDAMPF is a tool oriented to the Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) community, which allows the simulation of the physical properties of materials under variable relative humidity (RH). In particular, pyDAMPF is mainly focused on the mechanical properties of polymeric hygroscopic nanofibers that play an essential role in designing tissue scaffolds for implants and filtering devices. Those mechanical properties have been mostly studied from a very coarse perspective reaching a micrometer scale. However, at the nanoscale, the mechanical response of polymeric fibers becomes cumbersome due to both experimental and theoretical limitations. For example, the response of polymeric fibers to RH demands advanced models that consider sub-nanometric changes in the local structure of each single polymer chain. From an experimental viewpoint, choosing the optimal cantilevers to scan the fibers under variable RH is not trivial.