Cantilever bending based on humidity-actuated mesoporous silica/silicon bilayers

• Christian Ganser,
• Gerhard Fritz-Popovski,
• Roland Morak,
• Parvin Sharifi,
• Benedetta Marmiroli,
• Barbara Sartori,
• Heinz Amenitsch,
• Thomas Griesser,
• Christian Teichert and
• Oskar Paris

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2016, 7, 637–644, doi:10.3762/bjnano.7.56

• layer is related to the cantilever deflection using simple bilayer bending theory. We also develop a simple quantitative model for cantilever deflection which only requires cantilever geometry and nanostructural parameters of the porous layer as input parameters. Keywords: AFM cantilever; bilayer

• parameters of the pores such as their volume fraction and their mean curvature radius. Measurement of the RH-dependent pore lattice strain with GISAXS and comparison with the cantilever deflection using classical bilayer bending theory allows for estimating the Young’s modulus of the porous film. This is

• bending; grazing incidence small-angle X-ray scattering (GISAXS); mesoporous film; sorption-induced deformation; Introduction Because the bending of a microcantilever can be measured with extremely high accuracy, sensors utilizing this principle are in focus of recent research. Such sensors are able, for