Abstract
Wood as a material shows exceptional effective properties, but its biological origins give rise to an important lack of physico-chemical and biochemical stabilities and a great variability of the organization of its basic components at various scales (annual ring, woody tissues, cell, cell wall, cell wall component, macromolecules). In this thesis, Atomic Force Microscopy has been used as characterisation tool of the mechanical properties. Quantifying the viscoelstic properties of wood cell wall layers was the goal of this study. New experimental protocoles have been developed in order to improve the quality of the wood sample, the calibration of AFM cantilever stiffness and tip radius and of its answer while using a particular AFM mode: the resonant contact mode. Results are in the same range as those found in the literature and future improvements will answer questions that no other technique is capable of at the time beeing.