Infrared images of single electrons

Scattering-type near-field optical microscopy (s-SNOM) is a powerful technique to image nano objects. It can be employed in a broad spectral range, namely the complete infrared region spanning from the terahertz range up to the visible range. In this article we describe a system which utilizes a free-electron laser as a spectrally narrow and widely tunable source of infrared radiation. This system was employed to study electrons confined in self-assembled InAs quantum dots. We spatially resolved single quantum dots upon resonant excitation of transitions between discrete energy levels of the confined electrons.