Description: In situ manipulation of scanning tunneling microscope tips without tip holder

This title appears in the Scientific Report : 2010

In situ manipulation of scanning tunneling microscope tips without tip holder

A design for a manipulator system for manipulating bare scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) tips without any tip holder is presented. The extremely stiff and rigid system consists of an ultrahigh vacuum compatible fully three-dimensionally movable gripper module driven by stepping motors and piezomo...

Personal Name(s):	Raad, C.
	Graf, K.H. / Ebert, Ph.
Contributing Institute:	Mikrostrukturforschung; IFF-8
Published in:	Review of scientific instruments, 81 (2010) S. 013706
Imprint:	[S.l.] American Institute of Physics 2010
Physical Description:	013706
DOI:	10.1063/1.3284508
PubMed ID:	20113106
Document Type:	Journal Article
Research Program:	Grundlagen für zukünftige Informationstechnologien
Series Title:	Review of Scientific Instruments 81
Subject (ZB):	J grippers micromanipulators scanning tunnelling microscopy stepping motors
Link:	Get full text OpenAccess OpenAccess
	Publikationsportal JuSER

Please use the identifier: http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.3284508 in citations.
Please use the identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/2128/16757 in citations.

A design for a manipulator system for manipulating bare scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) tips without any tip holder is presented. The extremely stiff and rigid system consists of an ultrahigh vacuum compatible fully three-dimensionally movable gripper module driven by stepping motors and piezomotors. The tips are clamped by hardened tool steel gripper jaws, which are controlled by a stepping motor through levers. The system allows the reproducible manipulation of bare tungsten tips made of wires with diameters of 0.25 nm and having length of only up to 3 mm without damaging the tip or the STM. The tip manipulators' advantage is that the total mass of the scanning piezotube is reduced by removing the mass of a separate tip holder. Thereby, it becomes possible to further increase the resonance frequencies of the STM.