Gentle and fast atomic force microscopy with a piezoelectric scanning probe for nanorobotics applications

A novel dual tip nanomanipulation atomic force microscope (AFM) platform operating in ambient conditions is presented. The system is equipped with a high frequency quartz piezoelectric self-sensing scanning probe for fast imaging and a passive cantilever for manipulation. The system is validated by imaging and selective pushing/pulling of gold colloid beads (diameters from 80 to 180 nm). This provides a more compact integration compared to an external optical lever and avoids several of its drawbacks such as optical interference and noise, and recalibration in the case of a moving cantilever and a fixed laser source and photodiode sensor. Moreover, as the quartz oscillator exhibits oscillation amplitudes in the sub-picometer range with a resonant frequency in the megahertz range, this dynamic force sensor is ideal for fast AFM imaging. Experiments show an increase by five times in imaging speed compared to a classical AFM system.