Quantitative wear evaluation of tips based on sharp structures

• Ke Xu and
• Houwen Leng

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2024, 15, 230–241, doi:10.3762/bjnano.15.22

• Ke Xu Houwen Leng School of Electrical & Control Engineering, Shenyang Jianzhu University, Shenyang 110168, China 10.3762/bjnano.15.22 Abstract To comprehensively study the influence of atomic force microscopy (AFM) scanning parameters on tip wear, a tip wear assessment method based on sharp

• , a set of principles for optimizing scanning parameters has been proposed. These principles consider both scanning precision and tip wear. To achieve these results, an AFM probe was used to scan sharp structures, precisely acquiring the tip morphology. Tip wear was minimized by employing lower

• scanning frequency and free amplitude, and a set point of approximately 0.2, resulting in clear, high-quality AFM images. Keywords: atomic force microscopy; estimated tip diameter; scanning parameter; tip reconstruction; tip wear; Introduction AFM is a commonly used multifunctional technology in

Exploring internal structures and properties of terpolymer fibers via real-space characterizations

• Michael R. Roenbeck and
• Kenneth E. Strawhecker

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2023, 14, 1004–1017, doi:10.3762/bjnano.14.83

• . Transverse elastic modulus quantifications We present these last results as relative stiffness variations because multiple AFM tips needed to be used to survey these multiple subdomains. Monitoring tip wear is cumbersome when targeting a broad survey of different regions of multiple fibers, so the results

• nanoscale material properties of the fiber surface, though they present additional challenges versus stiffness maps that must be addressed. In particular, tip wear has to be carefully monitored to ensure that the tip radius is well characterized in each scan. Here we focused ET analysis on small fiber

• subdomains (typically 500 nm × 500 nm, ca. 1 nm/pixel) to reduce the likelihood of tip wear. In addition, subdomains were initially mapped out with “sacrificial” AFM tips, and ET distributions were only then obtained from scans with fresh, well-characterized AFM tips. In quantitative scans, the shape of each

Two dynamic modes to streamline challenging atomic force microscopy measurements

• Alexei G. Temiryazev,
• Andrey V. Krayev and
• Marina P. Temiryazeva

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2021, 12, 1226–1236, doi:10.3762/bjnano.12.90

• and accordingly select Asp. Factors to consider are the risk of tip wear, sample deformation, and tip contamination. The most important parameter here is the tip–sample force at the turn-around point of the oscillation cycle. Note that this force Fp can be repulsive even in net-attractive regime. In

• order to avoid tip wear and possible sample damage we need to keep the extreme force to a necessary minimum. There are different approaches for the choice of the best regime [17][18][19][20][21]. This selection is quite contradictory as the attraction regime provides the most delicate conditions that

An atomic force microscope integrated with a helium ion microscope for correlative nanoscale characterization

• Santiago H. Andany,
• Gregor Hlawacek,
• Stefan Hummel,
• Charlène Brillard,
• Mustafa Kangül and
• Georg E. Fantner

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2020, 11, 1272–1279, doi:10.3762/bjnano.11.111

• ), which are glued to the cantilevers, offer high aspect ratio and excellent resistance to wear [22]. Because tip wear is the main cause of cantilever failure, and because cantilever exchange in the HIM requires the user to vent the chamber, wear resistance is critically important. To maneuver the AFM

Comparison of fresh and aged lithium iron phosphate cathodes using a tailored electrochemical strain microscopy technique

• Matthias Simolka,
• Hanno Kaess and
• Kaspar Andreas Friedrich

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2020, 11, 583–596, doi:10.3762/bjnano.11.46

• the vertical tip deflection is recorded. Each point consists of a measurement period with a dc-voltage pulse of |3| V if not otherwise stated for 10 ms followed by a dc-voltage off period of 15 ms. The |3| V dc-voltage amplitude was chosen as a compromise to minimise tip wear while keeping a distinct

Integration of sharp silicon nitride tips into high-speed SU8 cantilevers in a batch fabrication process

• Nahid Hosseini,
• Matthias Neuenschwander,
• Oliver Peric,
• Santiago H. Andany,
• Jonathan D. Adams and
• Georg E. Fantner

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 2357–2363, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.226

• made of SU8 to benefit from the ease of fabrication and the high-speed imaging capability of cantilevers made of this polymer, while oxide-sharpened silicon nitride tips provide tip sharpness and tip wear-resistance. The tip is anchored securely by being partially embedded in the polymer cantilever

• moulded tips, but they are less sharp than the typical silicon tips that are commercially available with tip radii of less than 2 nm. However, even for the ultra-sharp tips, tip wear is unavoidable and a great concern for AFM users. The tip wear problem has been reported as early as 1991 [38]. By assuming

• that all of the imaging parameters are set correctly, tip wear can still occur due to abrasive wear, fracture and adhesive wear [39][40]. The presented cantilevers have proven a good tip sharpness, and provide the well-established wear-resistance of silicon nitride tips, supplemented with their good

In situ characterization of nanoscale contaminations adsorbed in air using atomic force microscopy

• Jesús S. Lacasa,
• Lisa Almonte and
• Jaime Colchero

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 2925–2935, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.271

• specified properties during AFM operation [19][20]. Tip degradation, either tip wear or tip contamination from the sample, is mainly induced by AFM operation [18][20][21]. Other kinds of contamination that may affect the tip are organic contamination from ambient air, metallic pollutants due to the

Characterization of the microscopic tribological properties of sandfish (Scincus scincus) scales by atomic force microscopy

• Weibin Wu,
• Christian Lutz,
• Simon Mersch,
• Richard Thelen,
• Christian Greiner,
• Guillaume Gomard and
• Hendrik Hölscher

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 2618–2627, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.243

• aim to scratch the surface of the samples. To achieve such a large normal load, we utilized cantilevers with a nominal spring constants of 40 N/m. To avoid that tip wear influences the scratching tests, we started every experiment with a fresh cantilever with a pristine tip. On each sample, we

Friction force microscopy of tribochemistry and interfacial ageing for the SiO_x/Si/Au system

• Christiane Petzold,
• Marcus Koch and
• Roland Bennewitz

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 1647–1658, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.157

• material transfer for different tip–surface pairings (Figure 6). No changes at the tip apex were observed after sliding an intact Au/Si tip on oxidized Si(100) for 4.8 mm (Figure 6a). A tip wear of 325 nm was measured when the same tip was activated before sliding for 20 mm on oxidized Si(100) (Figure 6b

• (lattice spacing of 2.4 Å in the Au layer and 1.9 Å in the Si bulk are indicated in Figure 7c,d). The Au coating consisted of crystal grains of different orientation. Tip wear proceeded through the Au coating and the SiOx layer (Figure 7a). Low amounts of Cr were detected by EDX analysis, especially in the

• , tribochemical reactions cause a strong increase in friction and significant tip wear in the Si/SiOx/Au system. On reactive, clean Si(100) we found persistent adhesive wear, while the presence of oxidized silicon led to a re-passivation of the sliding interface within a few scan frames. Friction force maps for a

Nanoscale electrochemical response of lithium-ion cathodes: a combined study using C-AFM and SIMS

• Jonathan Op de Beeck,
• Nouha Labyedh,
• Alfonso Sepúlveda,
• Valentina Spampinato,
• Alexis Franquet,
• Thierry Conard,
• Philippe M. Vereecken,
• Wilfried Vandervorst and
• Umberto Celano

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 1623–1628, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.154

• stressing at 10 V, a net drop in conductivity (or observed current) is visible (10 V box Figure 1f). Since the observed morphology hardly changes (only a small effect is visible in case of a 10 V bias), taking tip wear into account, we believe that our bias stress up to 5 V does not induce modifications to

Scanning speed phenomenon in contact-resonance atomic force microscopy

• Christopher C. Glover,
• Jason P. Killgore and
• Ryan C. Tung

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 945–952, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.87

• , we have controlled for the effect of tip wear by rigorously pre-wearing the AFM tip and randomizing the order of data collection. Tip wear can significantly alter the geometry of a new AFM tip and thus the measured CR frequency. These wear effects must be accurately accounted for. It is well-known

• that the majority of tip wear happens early in the usage cycle of the microcantilever when the tip is pristine and extremely sharp [24][25]. By pre-wearing the tip, we ensure that large scale geometric evolution of the tip does not occur. Additionally, to control for the effect of wear over time, the

Material discrimination and mixture ratio estimation in nanocomposites via harmonic atomic force microscopy

• Weijie Zhang,
• Yuhang Chen,
• Xicheng Xia and
• Jiaru Chu

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 2771–2780, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.276

• modulation and resonance frequency in contact resonance AFM are used to extract the mechanical properties quantitatively [16][17]. However, the continuous tip–sample contact may cause severe sample damage or tip wear. In tapping mode, the tip can touch the sample periodically. Due to the nonlinear contact

Exploring wear at the nanoscale with circular mode atomic force microscopy

• Olivier Noel,
• Aleksandar Vencl and
• Pierre-Emmanuel Mazeran

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 2662–2668, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.266

• of the applied load (1 µN and 3 µN). Wear profiles (Figure 3D) obtained with the analysis procedure show also that the AFM tip conforms to the nanocomposite wear track during the wear process. The plateau could not be attributed to the wear of the probe during the wear process. At least, if the tip

• wear occurs, its worn volume contribution is negligible compared to the sample worn volume. One should rather consider that while the probe is going deeper and deeper into the wear track, the contact pressure is decreasing as the surface contact between the AFM tip and the substrate is increased

Material property analytical relations for the case of an AFM probe tapping a viscoelastic surface containing multiple characteristic times

• Enrique A. López-Guerra and
• Santiago D. Solares

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 2230–2244, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.223

• damage induced by constant tip drag. Additionally, these methods are prone to significant tip wear and contamination which could make quantitative characterization unreliable due to constant changes in tip geometry. Dynamic methods have been designed to overcome the above issues, whereby tapping-mode AFM

Functional dependence of resonant harmonics on nanomechanical parameters in dynamic mode atomic force microscopy

• Federico Gramazio,
• Matteo Lorenzoni,
• Francesc Pérez-Murano,
• Enrique Rull Trinidad,
• Urs Staufer and
• Jordi Fraxedas

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 883–891, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.90

• with a higher slope at the beginning and a lower slope afterwards. Because of the expected tip wear, the evolution observed in Figure 5 can be again ascribed to an increase in tip radius. This method has been proposed to monitor the stability of the tip in a continuous manner [13][26][27]. The

• images using softer cantilevers (kc ≈ 3 N/m), where both A1 and Asp have been intentionally varied during the experiment. Note that here A6 increases for increasing A1 values, as observed in Figure 7a, and that for a particular couple of A1 and Asp values, A6 increases due to tip wear, and thus to an

Boosting the local anodic oxidation of silicon through carbon nanofiber atomic force microscopy probes

• Gemma Rius,
• Matteo Lorenzoni,
• Soichiro Matsui,
• Masaki Tanemura and
• Francesc Perez-Murano

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2015, 6, 215–222, doi:10.3762/bjnano.6.20

• present paper. As far as the tips did not make contact with the surface (either by particle contamination or the surface or problems with feedback loop control) we did not observe tip wear. Discussion In Figure 6 the main results of the kinetics study of LAO-AFM are summarized. Figure 6a shows the line

Combining nanoscale manipulation with macroscale relocation of single quantum dots

• Francesca Paola Quacquarelli,
• Richard A. J. Woolley,
• Martin Humphry,
• Jasbiner Chauhan,
• Philip J. Moriarty and
• Ashley Cadby

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2012, 3, 324–328, doi:10.3762/bjnano.3.36

• , we can ascertain the minimum amount of surface–tip contact force required for the manipulation to take place; reducing tip wear and image degradation. Tip state also plays an important role in the manipulation process, and the automatic characterisation and optimization of the AFM tip apex would be