On advancement of high speed atomic force microscope technology

Abstract

High speed atomic force microscopy (AFM) is a developing process in which nanoscale objects, such as crystal structures or strands of DNA, can be imaged at rates fast enough to watch processes as they occur. Although current generation AFM is already pivotal in many fields of research and industry, slow scan rates inhibit the imaging of dynamic samples. Much advancement has been made in high speed AFM thus far, yet many subsystems remain to be developed. This thesis outlines the development of a feedback controller for the AFM scanner, as well as the filters designed to attenuate high frequency noise. A comparison of the scan signals and scanner output signals are compared, with and without the controller and filters. Post-data acquisition image processing techniques are also described and compared with raw data. Finally, these techniques are applied to the high speed imaging of calcite etched with hydrochloric acid.