AVS 46th International Symposium
    Applied Surface Science Division Monday Sessions
       Session AS-MoM

Paper AS-MoM2
A New Variable Temperature Beam-Deflection AFM

Monday, October 25, 1999, 8:40 am, Room 6A

Session: Imaging and Small Area Analysis
Presenter: P. Güthner, OMICRON Vakuumphysik GmbH, Germany
Authors: A. Feltz, OMICRON Vakuumphysik GmbH, Germany
P. Güthner, OMICRON Vakuumphysik GmbH, Germany
T. Berghaus, OMICRON Vakuumphysik GmbH, Germany
Correspondent: Click to Email
AFM experiments at variable temperature are very important for the investigation of phase transitions, growth behaviour, surface diffusion and other temperature depending processes on insulating surfaces with atomic resolution. For this purpose a new Variable Temperature AFM has been developed for minimum drift over a wide temperature range, i.e. AFM operation from 25 K to more than 1000 K. The special optical setup allows to realize a scanned-tip instrument. This allows to limit heating and cooling to the sample realizing a wide temperature range and low drift even for fast temperature changes. The beam deflection technique allows simultaneous topography and lateral force imaging in contact mode, non-contact mode AFM with true atomic resolution, as well as Magnetic Force Microscopy (MFM) and Electrostatic Force Microscopy (EFM). Au(111) was used to study friction at low temperatures. Images of the gold (111) surface in contact mode show the atomic structure and the 23 x @sr@3 surface reconstruction in the topography, and the friction image. At low temperatures down to 30 K the atomic scale friction is drastically increased. True atomic resolution has been achieved in dynamic mode images of silicon (111) 7x7 over a temperature range from 50 K up to about 1000 K. Silicon cantilevers prepared by sputter cleaning of the tip were used for these images. Further experiments will be performed on a non-conducting sample (NaCl).