As illustrated below, the cantilever is short and small. The chip edge and sample
surface should be kept parallel to each other in the AFM system to avoid any contact
of a chip shoulder and the sample surface. It is strongly recommended that both of
bottom-side surface of the chip and chip holder be kept clean and particle-free. A
contamination particle between them might tilt the chip to contact them each other.
While observing the lever and chip with an optical microscope of your AFM system,
you may find bright line or belt as shown in the illustration below. It works as a guide
to find the small cantilever before adjusting sensor optics. The cantilever locates near
the center of the bright line.
Chip edge
Bottom-side surface
of the chip
The tip radius is less than 30 nm. For higher-resolution in measurements, it is
recommended to fabricate another thin wire tip like a carbon at the apex of the tip.
Ver.1.1 Jul. 7, 2010
OLYMPUS CORPORATION
Please contact following if you have any question on this user’s manual.
OLYMPUS CORPORATION
Microtechnology R&D Division
2-3 Kuboyama-cho Hachioji-shi Tokyo 192-8512 Japan
Email : [email protected]
Please access to the web page of OLYMPUS micro cantilevers.
http://www.olympus.co.jp/probe
7
Making an additional tip on the tip
8
Information
- 8e -
5
Plate-like tip
Left image is an SEM image of the
cantilever apex viewing from the side.
The plate-like tip is located at the end
of the cantilever.
The plate-like tip elongates by around
1
m with its tip-tilt-angle at 35
degrees with respect to the normal line
of the cantilever.
Its corner edge of the plate-like tip
looks like a miniature tetrahedral tip
and behaves as the substantive tip
during the scanning
Schematic view of cantilever chip
６
When attaching a cantilever chip to AFM
1um
35 deg.
Tip
Lever
Bright line
Chip shoulders
- 7e -
Cantilever
Substantive tip