Fibers experience a wide variety of physical and chemical insults during processing. Consequently, the physical and chemical properties of their surfaces are not uniform. Microscopy is generally able to detect surface potogrphic variations, which may have significant effects on the behavior of textiles. However, surface chemical heterogeneities, which may be even more critical, are more difficult to detect, particularly when the variations are at the submicron level. Some of the newer techniques for characterizing surface chemical heterogeneities are reviewed for various textile structures. Abstract.