The curves above show the thermogravimetric analysis of a sample of green household paint. The evolved gases from the experiment were traped onto a tube in a similar fashion to that used for micro-TA EGA.

For comparative purposes the surface of a fresh sample of the paint was scanned with the probe at 500°C in order to decompose the surface layer (the region inside the dashed box show above left). The sorbent tube was again used to continuously sample the gases evolved during this process. The GC-MS data from both experiments are compared below. There are significant differences between the surface and the bulk sample - the latter contains significant amounts of butylated hydroxytoluene (an antioxidant) which has been depleted in the surface layer.