The invention itself, as well as a preferred mode of use, further objects, and advantages thereof, will best be understood by reference to the following detailed description of an illustrative embodiment when read in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, wherein:
a-1f are process flow diagrams of a method for manufacturing a near-field scanning optical microscope probe, in accordance with a preferred embodiment of the present invention;
a is a top view and
a-3b are detailed diagrams of the electrodes of a near-field scanning optical microscope probe, in accordance with a preferred embodiment of the present invention.
Referring now to the drawings and in particular to
With reference now to
Referring now to
In order to trap nanoparticles to form LED 33, electrodes 31-32 are immersed in a nanoparticle solution. A voltage is then applied to electrodes 31-32 in order to polarize and attract nanoparticles to the gap between electrodes 31-32 along the electric field gradient. In some cases, electrical charges on the surface are large enough to trap nanoparticles on the electrode without applying any voltage. Preferably, the voltage for trapping nanoparticles is approximately 50 V, and the voltage for driving probe 15 during usage is approximately 145 V. The relatively high driving voltage is due to the large resistance from the 2000 mm long silicon wiring on probe 15. In order to avoid electrical connection to samples to be tested, the trap nanoparticles can be covered with an insulating layer 34, such as a Parylene layer, via a chemical vapor deposition (CVD) process.
Other than electrostatic trapping of particles in a simple solution, particles that have already been aligned by other methods can also be trapped. For example, a film of nanoparticles made by the Lungmuir-blodgett method can also be trapped. A preparation of aligned nanoparticles before trapping gives better control in quality of trapped nanoparticles. In the case of Lungmuir-blodgett film, particles are prepared on the surface of water or soft material. In such a case, the electrodes are not necessarily immersed. The electrodes may just “touch the surface.”
One of the electrodes can be created after trapping semiconductor nanoparticles by means of CVD, evaporation or spin-coating. In addition, a probe body (such as probe body 17 in
A tuning fork is typically utilized to provide oscillation monitoring for a prior art NSOM probe. Since probe 15 is silicon-based, a piezo resistor 35 can be integrated into probe 15 by adding to the process flow of probe 15 as described in
As has been described, the present invention provides a NSOM probe having an LED. The NSOM of the present invention measures optical properties such as fluorescence on a nano-scale that cannot be measured by conventional atomic force microscopes (AFMs) or scanning tunneling microscopes (STMs).
While the invention has been particularly shown and described with reference to a preferred embodiment, it will be understood by those skilled in the art that various changes in form and detail may be made therein without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention.
The present patent application claims priority to copending provisional application U.S. Ser. No. 60/824,496, filed on Sep. 5, 2006.
Number | Date | Country | |
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60824496 | Sep 2006 | US |