Tag: Arrow AFM tip

Ferroelectric domains and phase transition of sol-gel processed epitaxial Sm-doped BiFeO3 (001) thin films

Read how Nanoworld Arrow-EFM AFM probes were used in the paper “Ferroelectric domains and phase transition of sol-gel processed epitaxial Sm-doped BiFeO3 (001) thin films” in which the authors Zhen Zhou, Wie Sun, Zhenyu Liao, Shuai Ning, Jing Zhu and Jing-Feng Li:

  • prepared 12% Sm-doped BiFeO3 epitaxial thin films on Nb-doped SrTiO3 (001) substrate via a sol-gel method
  • used PFM (piezoresponse force microscopy) to characterize the in-situ ferroelectric domain evolution from room temperature to 200 °C
  • illustrated a phase transition from ferroelectric to antiferroelectric phase by SS-PFM and found a significant piezoelectric response at the phase boundary

Their work revealed the origin of the high piezoresponse of Sm-doped BiFeO3 thin films at the morphotropic phase boundary (MPB).*

A PtIr-coated NanoWorld Arrow-EFM cantilever with a nominal spring constant of 2.8 N/m and a typical resonant frequency of 75 kHz was used in all imaging modes mentioned in the article.

Figure 3 from “Ferroelectric domains and phase transition of sol-gel processed epitaxial Sm-doped BiFeO3 (001) thin films” by Zhen Zhou et al. : PFM scanning results of the sample at 20 °C, 80 °C, 140 °C and 200 °C, (a)-(d) out-of-plane phase, (e)-(h) out-of-plane amplitude, (i)-(l) in-plane phase, and (m)-(p) in-plane amplitude. NanoWorld Arrow-EFM AFM probes were used in all imaging modes.
Figure 3 from “Ferroelectric domains and phase transition of sol-gel processed epitaxial Sm-doped BiFeO3 (001) thin films” by Zhen Zhou et al. : PFM scanning results of the sample at 20 °C, 80 °C, 140 °C and 200 °C, (a)-(d) out-of-plane phase, (e)-(h) out-of-plane amplitude, (i)-(l) in-plane phase, and (m)-(p) in-plane amplitude.

 
 
 
 
 
 
             
*Zhen Zhou, Wie Sun, Zhenyu Liao, Shuai Ning, Jing Zhu, Jing-Feng Li
Ferroelectric domains and phase transition of sol-gel processed epitaxial Sm-doped BiFeO3 (001) thin films

Journal of Materiomics, Volume 4, Issue 1, March 2018, Pages 27-34
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jmat.2017.11.002

Please follow this external link if you would like to read the full article: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352847817300631

Open Access The article “Ferroelectric domains and phase transition of sol-gel processed epitaxial Sm-doped BiFeO3 (001) thin films” by Zhen Zhou, Wie Sun, Zhenyu Liao, Shuai Ning, Jing Zhu and Jing-Feng Li is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.

 

Boron nitride nanoresonators for phonon-enhanced molecular vibrational spectroscopy at the strong coupling limit

In the article “Boron nitride nanoresonators for phonon-enhanced molecular vibrational spectroscopy at the strong coupling limit” the authors use, for the first time, phonon-polariton-resonant h-BN ribbons for SEIRA spectroscopy of small amounts of organic molecules in Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy. They demonstrate a new way to strongly couple infrared light and molecular vibrations, by utilizing phonon polariton nanoresonators made of hexagonal boron nitride, a Van der Waals material.

For the nanoscale Fourier transform infrared (nano-FTIR) spectroscopy mentioned in this article an oscillating Pt/Ir coated NanoWorld Arrow-NCPt AFM probe was illuminated by p-polarized mid-IR broadband radiation.

Figure 2 from "Boron nitride nanoresonators for phonon-enhanced molecular vibrational spectroscopy at the strong coupling limit": Far- and near-field spectroscopic characterization of h-BN ribbon arrays. (a) Sketch of the transmission spectroscopy experiment. Incoming light at normal incidence is polarized perpendicular to the ribbons to excite the HPhP resonance. (b) Transmission spectrum normalized to the bare substrate spectrum, T/T0, for a 20 × 20 μm2 h-BN ribbon array. Ribbon width w=158 nm, ribbon period D=400 nm and ribbon height h=40 nm. (c) Sketch of the nano-FTIR spectroscopy experiment. The near-field probing tip is scanned across (y-direction) the h-BN ribbon in 20-nm steps, as indicated by the dashed blue line. Near-field spectra are recorded as a function of the tip position (the detector signal is demodulated at the third harmonic of the tip tapping frequency, yielding s3(y, ω), as explained in the Materials and methods section). (d) Lower panel: Spectral line scan s3(y, ω), where each horizontal line corresponds to a spectrum recorded at a fixed y-position (vertical axis). Upper panel: Illustration of the real part of the z-component of the electric field (Re[Ez]) profile across the ribbon at the resonance frequency observed in the nano-FTIR spectra (lower panel). The AFM tip used was a NanoWorld Arrow-NCPT
Figure 2 from “Boron nitride nanoresonators for phonon-enhanced molecular vibrational spectroscopy at the strong coupling limit”: Far- and near-field spectroscopic characterization of h-BN ribbon arrays. (a) Sketch of the transmission spectroscopy experiment. Incoming light at normal incidence is polarized perpendicular to the ribbons to excite the HPhP resonance. (b) Transmission spectrum normalized to the bare substrate spectrum, T/T0, for a 20 × 20 μm2 h-BN ribbon array. Ribbon width w=158 nm, ribbon period D=400 nm and ribbon height h=40 nm. (c) Sketch of the nano-FTIR spectroscopy experiment. The near-field probing tip is scanned across (y-direction) the h-BN ribbon in 20-nm steps, as indicated by the dashed blue line. Near-field spectra are recorded as a function of the tip position (the detector signal is demodulated at the third harmonic of the tip tapping frequency, yielding s3(y, ω), as explained in the Materials and methods section). (d) Lower panel: Spectral line scan s3(y, ω), where each horizontal line corresponds to a spectrum recorded at a fixed y-position (vertical axis). Upper panel: Illustration of the real part of the z-component of the electric field (Re[Ez]) profile across the ribbon at the resonance frequency observed in the nano-FTIR spectra (lower panel).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Marta Autore, Peining Li, Irene Dolado, Francisco J Alfaro-Mozaz, Ruben Esteban, Ainhoa Atxabal, Fèlix Casanova, Luis E Hueso, Pablo Alonso-González, Javier Aizpurua, Alexey Y Nikitin, Saül Vélez & Rainer Hillenbrand
Boron nitride nanoresonators for phonon-enhanced molecular vibrational spectroscopy at the strong coupling limit
Light: Science & Applications 7, 17172 (2018)
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/lsa.2017.172

For the full article please follow this external link: https://rdcu.be/7B0F

The article: Boron nitride nanoresonators for phonon-enhanced molecular vibrational spectroscopy at the strong coupling limit by Marta Autore et. al, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in the credit line; if the material is not included under the Creative Commons license, users will need to obtain permission from the license holder to reproduce the material. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

High resolution imaging of amorphous glass surfaces in liquid

Inspired by Kristen M. Burson et al.’s “Resolving amorphous solid-liquid interfaces by atomic force microscopy”, Applied Physics Letters 108, 201602 (2016); http://aip.scitation.org/doi/abs/10.1063/1.4949556, the scans below were made by Dr. Roger Proksch of Asylum Research using a NanoWorld Arrow UHF AFM probe and an Asylum Cypher Atomic Force Microscope.

Figure 1. Topography images of disordered lattice imaged at an amplitude setpoint of 2 nm. a) 10nm scan and b) 5nm scan. Both images clearly demonstrate sub-nm amorphous glass surface.
Figure 1. Topography images of disordered lattice imaged at an amplitude setpoint of 2 nm. a) 10nm scan and b) 5nm scan. Both images clearly demonstrate sub-nm amorphous glass surface.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 2. a) Surface topography and b) tip-sample stiffness of a region of the glass sample imaged using AMFM stiffness mapping. 10 nm scan
Figure 2. a) Surface topography and b) tip-sample stiffness of a region of the glass sample imaged using AMFM stiffness mapping. 10 nm scan

 

 

 

 

 

 
 

Using blueDrive and the NanoWorld Arrow UHF AFM tip, it was also possible to simultaneously map the topography and tip-sample stiffness using AM-FM mode (Figure 2). Like Burson et al., a disordered-appearing surface, with length scales similar to those reported in that paper could be seen. Interestingly, these structures were visible with slightly different resolutions with every attempt made. This is a testament to the low noise of the Cypher AFM and to the reliable sharpness of the Arrow UHF cantilevers.

Courtesy of Dr. Roger Proksch, Asylum Research, an Oxford Instruments Company.

#afmprobes #afmtips #atomicforcemicroscopy #AFM