Atomic force microscopy reconstruction of complex-shaped chiral plasmonic nanostructures

TL;DR

This paper presents a method combining advanced AFM techniques and post-processing to accurately reconstruct complex-shaped chiral plasmonic nanostructures, enhancing understanding of their optical metamaterial properties.

Contribution

It introduces a novel approach integrating vertical and tilted AFM probes with post-processing to improve shape reconstruction of periodical plasmonic nanostructures with known symmetry.

Findings

Enhanced reconstruction accuracy for complex chiral nanostructures

Extended deconvolution algorithm capabilities for periodical features

Improved understanding of nanostructure shapes in optical metamaterials

Abstract

A significant part of the optical metamaterial phenomena has the plasmonic nature and their investigation requires very accurate knowledge of the fabricated structures shape with a focus on the periodical features. We describe a consistent approach to the shape reconstruction of the plasmonic nanostructures. This includes vertical and tilted spike AFM probes fabrication, AFM imaging and specific post-processing. We studied a complex-shaped chiral metamaterial and conclude that the described post-processing routine extends possibilities of the existing deconvolution algorithms in the case of periodical structures with known rotational symmetry, by providing valuable information about periodical features.