A scanning probe microscope for magnetoresistive cantilevers utilizing a nested scanner design for large-area scans

作者：Meier Tobias^*; Foerste Alexander; Tavassolizadeh Ali; Rott Karsten; Meyners Dirk; Groeger Roland; Reiss Gunter; Quandt Eckhard; Schimmel Thomas; Hoelscher Hendrik

来源：Beilstein Journal of Nanotechnology, 2015, 6: 451-461.

DOI：10.3762/bjnano.6.46

• atomic force microscopy (AFM)
• magnetomechanical effects
• magnetostriction
• scanning probe microscopes and components

We describe an atomic force microscope (AFM) for the characterization of self-sensing tunneling magnetoresistive (TMR) cantilevers. Furthermore, we achieve a large scan-range with a nested scanner design of two independent piezo scanners: a small high resolution scanner with a scan range of 5 x 5 x 5 mu m(3) is mounted on a large-area scanner with a scan range of 800 x 800 x 35 mu m(3). In order to characterize TMR sensors on AFM cantilevers as deflection sensors, the AFM is equipped with a laser beam deflection setup to measure the deflection of the cantilevers independently. The instrument is based on a commercial AFM controller and capable to perform large-area scanning directly without stitching of images. Images obtained on different samples such as calibration standard, optical grating, EPROM chip, self-assembled monolayers and atomic step-edges of gold demonstrate the high stability of the nested scanner design and the performance of self-sensing TMR cantilevers.

• 出版日期2015-2-13