Application of self-actuated 32 cantilever array in atomic force surface measurements


Application of self-actuated 32 cantilever array in atomic force surface measurements

Gotszalk, T.; Zawierucha, P.; Woszczyna, M.; Zielony, M.; Ivanov, T.; Ivanova, K.; Volland, B. E.; Sarov, Y.; Persaud, A.; Dontzov, D.; Schmidt, B.; Nikolov, N.; Kostic, I.; Engl, W.; Sulzbach, T.; Mielczarski, J.; Kolb, S.; Pedreau, R.; Huq, S. E.; Edinger, K.; Fortagne, O.; Blom, H. O.; Rangelow, I. W.

Main industry requirement for applying scanning probe microscopy in surface measurements is the high
scan speed, which allow the microelectronics producers to obtain the information about the technological
process quality in-situ on the semiconductor wafer. Common single topography measurement consume few
minutes for scanning area about 100 μm2 because of limited cantilever dynamic properties. To overcome
this problem one may utilize the cantilever with resonance frequency above 1 MHz but in this case,
cantilever suffer from wear and it requires complicated, large bandwidth measurement system. Different
approach to high speed topography measurement is to apply massive array of cantilevers, where the
surface topography image is taken simultaneously from every probe.
In the contribution present the application of the one dimensional VLSI NEMS-chip (Very Large Scale
Integrated Nano Electro Mechanical System) incorporating 32 proximal probes for high speed atomic force
microscopy measurements will be presented. Each array cantilever integrates a thermal deflection actuator, a
piezoresistor acting as a deflection detector and a microtip with radius of 10 nm.

Keywords: NEMS; proximal AFM probe array; piezoresistive deflection sensing; thermal deflection actuation

  • Poster
    34th Micro and Nano Engineering Conference MNE08, 15.-18.09.2008, Athens, Greece

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Publ.-Id: 12183