Development and Applications of Polarization Near-Field Optical Microscopy

摘要

Polarization optical microscopy has been widely employed in studying the properties of crystalline domains. However, the optical diffraction limits its spatial resolution to submicron scale. On the other hand, scanning probe microscopy has nanometer spatial resolution. But it lacks optical information to distinguish the material properties. We develop new microscopes that combine the optical polarization and scanning probe microscopy. They can quantitatively study the organized domains with a resolution below 100 nm. In this article, two kinds of microscopes are introduced. One is the "polarization-modulation near-field optical microscope" used for studying the organized domains in thin films. The other is the "near-field magneto-optical microscope" used for studying submicron magnetic domains.