Improved method for atomic force microscope cantilever calibration

Author

Slattery, A.D. ; Gibson, C.T. ; Quinton, J.S.

Author_Institution

Smart Surface Struct. Group, Flinders Univ., Adelaide, SA, Australia

fYear

2010

fDate

22-26 Feb. 2010

Firstpage

407

Lastpage

410

Abstract

The development of an improved method for calibrating AFM cantilevers is presented, based on the Cleveland method. A masking technique is used to deposit gold on the very end of the cantilever, and the shift in resonant frequency with added mass is used to calculate the spring constant. A novel and unique application of scanning Raman microscopy was developed to measure the thickness distribution of the deposited gold film over the cantilever. The uncertainty in the spring constant of cantilevers calibrated using this method was determined to be ~10%, and in good agreement with established calibration methods in literature.

Keywords

atomic force microscopy; calibration; cantilevers; gold; masks; metallic thin films; microscopes; optical microscopy; AFM cantilevers; Au; Cleveland method; atomic force microscope cantilever calibration; calibration methods; cantilever spring constant; gold film; masking technique; resonant frequency; scanning Raman microscopy; thickness distribution; Calibration; Films; Gold; Microscopy; Silicon; Springs; Thickness measurement;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Nanoscience and Nanotechnology (ICONN), 2010 International Conference on

Conference_Location

Sydney, NSW

Print_ISBN

978-1-4244-5261-3

Electronic_ISBN

978-1-4244-5262-0

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/ICONN.2010.6045265

Filename

6045265