Scanning probe microscopy based on novel micro electromechanical system probes are called active cantilevers. Cantilevers with integrated actuation and sensing provide several advantages over passive cantilevers, which rely on piezoelectric excitation and optical beam deflection measurement. The most recent development in this field is the realization of arrays of active cantilevers for high-throughput parallel SPM imaging.
The arrays of active cantilevers use integrated piezoresistive sensors to offer sensitivity comparable to optical readout methods without diffraction limits to allow smaller, softer, and more compact AFM probes. The results of this technique paved the way for the operation and building of high-throughput atomic force microscopes using high-speed multichannel electronics. The advances in this technique can facilitate the faster and more reliable operation of massively parallel active cantilever systems in the future.
Summary
Automatically generated
Large-scale sample inspection with nanoscale resolution has a wide range of applications, especially for nanofabricated semiconductor wafers. Atomic force microscopes can be a great tool for this purpose, but are limited by their imaging speed. This work utilizes parallel active cantilever arrays in AFMs to enable high-throughput and large-scale inspections.
Xia, F., Youcef-Toumi, K., Sattel, T., Manske, E., Rangelow, I. W. Active Probe Atomic Force Microscopy with Quattro-Parallel Cantilever Arrays for High-Throughput Large-Scale Sample Inspection. J. Vis. Exp. (196), e65210, doi:10.3791/65210 (2023).