Simultaneous Measurements of Surface Topography and Damping Energy by Noncontact Atomic Force Microscopy

摘要

We have simultaneously observed topographic images and damping energy images of a Si( 111)7×7 surface using noncontact atomic force microscopy (nc-AFM). The damping energy means the excitation energy required to maintain a constant oscillation amplitude of an nc-AFM cantilever. The topographic images exhibit the 7×7 reconstruction, and the damping images also clearly exhibit the atomic corrugation, which show the dependence of bias voltage between an nc-AFM tip and the sample. We discuss the damping energy, which is related to the interaction between the tip and the sample, as a measure for surface features with atomic resolution.