Creation of nanostructures on gold surfaces in nonconducting liquid

Chang, Ting Chang; Chang, Ch.; Lin, Heh‐Nan; Tsong, Tien T.

doi:10.1063/1.114689

Cited by 24 publications

(29 citation statements)

References 1 publication

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“…This appearance of mounds and craters is also well known from nanostructuring experiments where contact was established [17] or voltage pulses were applied [18,19]. In some experiments it was already concluded that field emission is not the crucial process for the pattern formation [18][19][20].…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 71%

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The mechanism of nanostructuring upon nanosecond laser irradiation of a STM tip

Boneberg

Münzer

Tresp

et al. 1998

Applied Physics A: Materials Science & Processing

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Abstract. The mechanism of nanostructuring by illumination of scanning probe tips is examined. For that purpose the tip of a scanning tunneling microscope is illuminated with nanosecond and femtosecond laser pulses. The observation of a transient increase of the tunneling current on the timescale of µs is indicative of thermal expansion, which amounts to several nm for the energy density necessary for the purpose of nanostructuring. Furthermore, quantized electrical resistance can be observed upon illumination, which shows the formation of mechanical contact between tip and surface. Thus it is concluded that the appearance of nanostructures (craters or mounds) is dominated by the cohesion properties of the tip/sample combination. Finally it is shown that even a huge increase of the involved electromagnetic field, reached by the reduction of the pulse length from 10 ns to 100 fs, does not change this scenario. 61.16.Ch; 65.70.+y Recent experiments have shown the possibility of surface nanostructuring by illumination of a scanning microscope tip with ns laser pulses [1][2][3][4][5]. This seems to be a promising method since a high degree of reproducibility has been reported [3][4][5]. Furthermore this method is applicable to different materials (for example Au, Au/Pd, Ti, PMMA, polycarbonate, organic media) as well as with different kinds of microscopes (AFM and STM) [3][4][5]. However, the responsible mechanism is controversial. On one hand field enhancement in the vicinity of the tip and subsequent field evaporation is proposed, while thermal effects are ruled out [1][2][3][4][5]. On the other hand mechanical contact as a result of thermal expansion is discussed as well [6][7][8]. Such thermal effects have also been observed in other combinations of pulsed laser light with scanning microscope tips [9][10][11]. PACS:We performed transient measurements of the tunneling current during such experiments, which should enable us to distinguish between these two models due to the different time scales involved. Whereas a field evaporation mechanism should take place on the time scale of the laser pulse (ns), a thermal effect occurs with a typical cooling time in the order of µs (from τ = d 2 /2D one can estimate a relaxation time of 73 µs for a tungsten tip with a thermal diffusivity D of 0.68 cm 2 /s and a focus diameter d = 100 µm). Following the thermal model it might also be possible to observe indications of the mechanical contact, for example quantized conductance of the junction formed upon illumination. Therefore we present measurements of the gap resistance of a STM upon illumination with a ns laser pulse. Finally a comparison of current transients after illumination with ns and fs laser pulses, respectively, is shown.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 71%

“…In some experiments it was already concluded that field emission is not the crucial process for the pattern formation [18][19][20]. Alternatively it was suggested that the extent of cohesion between tip and surface and a subsequent plastic deformation is the crucial parameter of the pattern formation [17,19].…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The mechanism of nanostructuring upon nanosecond laser irradiation of a STM tip

Boneberg

Münzer

Tresp

et al. 1998

Applied Physics A: Materials Science & Processing

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show abstract

“…4(b). The point contact or field evaporation is not a plausible mechanism for a mound formation because the formation of the craters or pits are not observed as such in typical Au surfaces with hard tungsten tips [11]. Also, the current is not as large as in point contact during the fabrication.…”

Section: µMmentioning

confidence: 99%

Multi-Functional Probe Recording: Field-Induced Recording and Near-Field Optical Readout

Park¹,

Kim²,

Song³

et al. 2004

ETRI J

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We demonstrate a high-speed recording based on fieldinduced manipulation in combination with an optical reading of recorded bits on Au cluster films using the atomic force microscope (AFM) and the near-field scanning optical microscope (NSOM). We reproduced 50 nm-sized mounds by applying short electrical pulses to conducting tips in a non-contact mode as a writing process. The recorded marks were then optically read using bent fiber probes in a transmission mode. A strong enhancement of light transmission is attributed to the local surface plasmon excitation on the protruded dots.Keywords: atomic force microscope (AFM), near-field scanning optical microscope (NSOM), probe, high speed recording, near-field optical readout.

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“…Further, we determine the conditions under which this purely elastic deformation results in jump to contact and show that they agree quantitatively with published experimental results by Guo and Thompson [11] for material transfer between tip and sample by voltage pulsing. Field-induced elastic jump to contact is thus an alternative to the field evaporation mechanism proposed in many STM nanofabrication experiments [11][12][13] the validity of which remains controversial [11,14].…”

Section: Field-induced Deformation As a Mechanism For Scanning Tunnelmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This discrepancy may occur in part because large-scale elastic deformation is precluded in molecular dynamics simulations, due to the small volume in which atomic coordinates are allowed to relax. Indeed, if jump to contact can be achieved by purely elastic deformation, then this will preempt mechanisms that have been proposed based on plastic deformation [11,14,26].…”

Section: Field-induced Deformation As a Mechanism For Scanning Tunnelmentioning

confidence: 99%