Image of the Month

PRIcon
Image of the Month
Posted Date: August 1, 2010
institution

RHEED intensity oscillation monitored on the specular spot during the growth of the LSMO on STO substrate at 900 °C. Inset a1 and a2: RHEED pattern obtained before and after deposition, respectively. (b) Resistivity/magnetization vs temperature curves for LSMO thin films of 5 nm thickness. STM topographic images (1×1 um2) with set point (sample bias 0.7 V, current 0.5 nA) taken at (c) 300 K and (d) 105 K.

Reprinted with permission from Abhimanyu Rana, Kashinath Bogle, Onkar Game, Shankar Patil, Nagarajan Valanoor, and Satishchandra Ogale, APPLIED PHYSICS LETTERS 96, 263108 2010. Copyright 2010, American Institute of Physics.

Microscope:
UHV3500 VT with Variable Magnetic Field

Controls:
RHK SPM 100

Contributors:
Abhimanyu Rana, Kashinath Bogle, Onkar Game, Shankar Patil, Nagarajan Valanoor, and Satishchandra Ogale – NCL, Pune and Univ. of New South Wales

Reference:
APPLIED PHYSICS LETTERS 96, 263108 (2010)

+Show More
PRIcon
Image of the Month
Posted Date: July 1, 2010
institution

STM image of organometallic structures formed when dosing phenyl diisocyanide (PDI) on a reconstructed Au(111) surface. The chains that originate at the gold atoms island indicated by the white dash line resemble the shape of a “Nano Spider”. The molecules were dosed from a kundsen type source as described in the following link:
LINK

Imaging conditions: Scan size: 20nm x 20nm. Image taken at room temperature with a tunneling current It=206pA and a sample bias voltabe Vb=-2.0V

Microscope:
UHV750 STM/AFM scan head

Controls:
RHK SPM 100

Contributors:
Jorge A. Boscoboinik, Florencia C. Calaza and Wilfred T. Tysoe. Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of Wisconsin Milwaukee

+Show More
PRIcon
Image of the Month
Posted Date: May 1, 2010
iotm-may-2010

Microscope:
RHK Technology UHV 7500 AFM/STM

Surface-deposition of single molecules on the nanometer scale will be crucial for many applications in nanotechnology since even single molecules are expected to serve as functional elements in nanoelectronics, nanooptics, nanomechanics and nanoquantumoptics.

The quantum wave nature of massive objects is already nowadays routinely used to shape and characterize materials on the nanoscale, e.g. in electron microscopy, neutron diffraction or atom interferometry.

Here we report on the first experimental demonstration of quantum interference lithography with complex molecules. Molecular quantum interference patterns are deposited onto a reconstructed Si(111) 7×7 surface and imaged using scanning tunneling microscopy.

Figure 1 shows single C60 molecules deposited onto the surface. In the inset one can even get a glimpse of the inner molecular ring structure.

In figure 2 the white dots represent the coarse grained digitized images of individual molecules. The period of the interference pattern is 267 nm. Both the particle and the quantum wave character of the molecules can thus be visualized in one and the same image when nanolithography becomes part of a sensitive high-resolution detection scheme for quantum interference with large molecules.

Controls:
RHK Technology SPM 1000 Control System featuring XPMPro, PLLPro AFM Control System, and PMC100.

Contributors:
Thomas Juffmann, Stefan Truppe, Philipp Geyer, Andras G. Major, Sarayut Deachapunya, Hendrik Ulbricht, and Markus Arndt – University of Vienna, Burapha University, University of Southampton

Juffmann et al. Phys. Rev. Lett. 103, 263601 (2009)

+Show More
PRIcon
Image of the Month
Posted Date: March 1, 2010
iotm-march-2010

Microscope:
RHK Technology UHV 7500 AFM/STM

Kelvin Probe Measurement on graphene exfoliated on SrTiO3 (Strontium titanate) obtained in non-contact AFM mode using a frequency shift of -5 Hz. The graphene was irradiated with Xenon 23+ ions under grazing incidence of 6°. On monolayer the impact of the ions lead to characteristic folding. In Bias-Image the exposed underlying substrate in this area can be clearly seen. Also the monolayer shows lower surface potential difference to SrTiO3 than few monolayers. EFM-Cantilever (Pt coated) from Budget Sensors with resonance frequency of 260 KHz (ElectriTap300-G). The cantilever oscillation amplitude is 22 nm and the data was obtained at room temperature.

Controls:
RHK Technology SPM 1000 Control System featuring XPMPro, PLLPro AFM Control System, and PMC100.

Contributors:
Benedict Kleine Bußmann, Oliver Ochedowski, Marika Schleberger AG Schleberger, University Duisburg-Essen

+Show More
PRIcon
Image of the Month
Posted Date: February 1, 2010
institution

Microscope:
RHK Technology UHV 300 STM – Ambient STM Imaging and Spectroscopy

The image above is a single 4th generation PAMAM-OH dendrimer. The dendrimer was imaged using a novel metal-ion doping procedure as per C.J. Fleming, Y.X. Liu, Z. Deng, G-y Liu*, J Phys Chem A, 2009, 113, 4168-4174.

The image was obtained at a set point of 0.33 V and 20 pA under ambient conditions using RHK hardware and the new XPM Pro software.

Controls:
RHK Technology SPM 1000 Control System

Contributors:
Christopher J. Fleming, Ying X. Liu, Zhao Deng, and Gang-yu Liu – Department of Chemistry, UniVersity of California, DaVis, California

Reference: C.J. Fleming, Y.X. Liu, Z. Deng, G-y Liu*, J Phys Chem A, 2009, 113, 4168-4174

+Show More
PRIcon
Image of the Month
Posted Date: September 1, 2009
iotm-september-2009

Microscope:
RHK Technology UHV 300 VT-STM

Onset of the Cu2O-like island formation on Cu (100) visualized by CCT-STM images recorded after the O2 exposure of 9.4 x 105 L (pO2 =3.7 10-2 mbar, TS=373 K).

Controls:
RHK Technology SPM 1000 Control System

Contributors:
K. Lahtonen, M. Hirsimaki, M. Lampimaki, and M. Valden – Surface Science Laboratory, Tampere University of Technology

Reference: THE JOURNAL OF CHEMICAL PHYSICS 129, 124703 2008

+Show More
PRIcon
Image of the Month
Posted Date: August 1, 2009
institution

Topography of three substituted Mn acceptors in the first layer of p-GaAs(110) surface

Microscope:
Custom-Built Low Temperature UHV STM
Temperature: > 7.3K
Vacuum: < 1×10-10 torr
High Tunnel Junction Stability < 2pm

Controls:
RHK Technology SPM 1000 Control System

Contributors:
Donghun Lee, David Daughton and Dr. Jay Gupta The Gupta group, Dept. of Physics, the Ohio State University

+Show More
PRIcon
Image of the Month
Posted Date: May 1, 2009
iotm-may-2009

The image was taken at 50 mV and 100 pA, and at 83 K, with a home-built STM operating in constant current mode. It shows a multilayer structure for (/S/,/S/)-tartaric acid, C4H6O6, grown on Ag(111). Each bright oval in the first layer, along with each bright circle in the overlayer, corresponds to a single tartaric acid molecule. The feature along the right side of the image is a single Ag(111) step.

Microscope:
Home-Built STM Operating in Constant Current Mode

Controls:
RHK Technology SPM 1000 Control System

Contributors:
Nancy Santagata, Pengshun Luo, Amit Lakhani, Darryl Dewitt, B. Scott Day, Michael Norton, Thomas Pearl
Pearl Group – Department of Physics, North Carolina State University

+Show More
PRIcon
Image of the Month
Posted Date: March 1, 2009
iotm-march-2009

At room temperature the sample shows no magnetic features. When the sample is cooled the LCMO goes through a phase transition and becomes magnetic. The sample has then reached temperatures below 250K.

LCMO, “On/Off”
The sample in the image below has been cooled to 195K. The direction of the magnetic “strips” change as the magnetic field is turned on and off.

LCMO, “Ramped Up “
The sample in the image below has been cooled to 195K. The magnetic “strip” fades as the magnetic field is turned up.

Microscope:
RHK Variable Magnetic Field, Cryogen-Free, UHV AFM/STM

Controls:
RHK Technology SPM 1000 Control System

Contributors:
RHK Technology, Inc.
Zhouhang Wang, Adam Kollin, Sergiy Pryadkin, Gennady Royzenblat

Sample Provided By:
India Institute of Technology, Kanpur
Professor Ramesh Budhani, Mr. Gyanendra Singh

+Show More
PRIcon
Image of the Month
Posted Date: December 1, 2008
institution

Microscope:
Homebuilt

Controls:
RHK Technology SPM 1000 Control System

Description:
The topography and near-field images were obtained with shear-force microscopy using a chemically etched gold tip attached to a quartz tuning fork. The confocal Raman instrument used in this experiment is based on an inverted optical microscope equipped with an x,y-scan stage. A high numerical aperture objective (1.4 NA) is used to focus a radially polarized laser beam with wavelength 785nm on the sample surface. The scattered light is collected using the same objective and then detected with a single-photon counting avalanche photodiode (APD). The images lateral sizes are 5 micra.

The sample is a self-organized carbon nanotube serpentine on a quartz substrate produced by Prof. Ernesto Joselevich’s group, at the Weizmann Institute of Science.

Gustavo Cancado and Lukas Novotny
Institute of Optics, University of Rochester

+Show More