Atomic force microscope scanning head with 3-dimensional orthogonal scanning to eliminate the curved coupling

Yushu Shi; Wei Li; Sitian Gao; Mingzhen Lu; Xiaodong Hu

doi:10.1016/j.ultramic.2018.03.020

Atomic force microscope scanning head with 3-dimensional orthogonal scanning to eliminate the curved coupling

Ultramicroscopy. 2018 Jul:190:77-80. doi: 10.1016/j.ultramic.2018.03.020. Epub 2018 Mar 28.

Authors

Yushu Shi¹, Wei Li², Sitian Gao³, Mingzhen Lu², Xiaodong Hu⁴

Affiliations

¹ State Key Laboratory of Precision Measuring Technology and Instruments, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, China; National Institute of Metrology, Beijing 100029, China.
² National Institute of Metrology, Beijing 100029, China.
³ National Institute of Metrology, Beijing 100029, China. Electronic address: gaost@nim.ac.cn.
⁴ State Key Laboratory of Precision Measuring Technology and Instruments, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, China. Electronic address: xdhu@tju.edu.cn.

PMID: 29704728
DOI: 10.1016/j.ultramic.2018.03.020

Abstract

An atomic force microscopy (AFM) scanning head is designed with the probe orthogonal scanning mode for metrological AFM to eliminate the curvature distortion. The AFM probe is driven by piezostage and the scanning trajectory of the probe in 3 directions are orthogonal to reduce the cross coupling. A new optical lever amplification optical path is developed to eliminate the coupling error. The tracing lens and probe tip are moved as an integrated part. The AFM is operated at contacting mode. The step approach process of the probe tip is tested to the sample surface and the noise of the AFM head is analyzed. The response of the probe demonstrates a 0.5 nm resolution of the probe head in the z direction. Finally, the planar scanning performance of the scanning head is demonstrated compared with tube scanning AFM.

Keywords: Atomic force microscope; Nanometrology; Scanning head; Surface topography.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't