Advances in atomic force microscopy

TL;DR

This review discusses recent advancements in atomic force microscopy (AFM) in ultra-high vacuum, highlighting improvements in resolution, techniques like FM-AFM, and new experimental possibilities such as imaging insulators and measuring atomic forces.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive overview of recent developments in AFM, especially in dynamic methods like FM-AFM, and discusses their impact on resolution and experimental capabilities.

Findings

Enhanced spatial resolution in vacuum AFM

Development of frequency modulation AFM techniques

Expanded experimental applications including insulator imaging

Abstract

This article reviews the progress of atomic force microscopy (AFM) in ultra-high vacuum, starting with its invention and covering most of the recent developments. Today, dynamic force microscopy allows to image surfaces of conductors \emph{and} insulators in vacuum with atomic resolution. The mostly used technique for atomic resolution AFM in vacuum is frequency modulation AFM (FM-AFM). This technique, as well as other dynamic AFM methods, are explained in detail in this article. In the last few years many groups have expanded the empirical knowledge and deepened the theoretical understanding of FM-AFM. Consequently, the spatial resolution and ease of use have been increased dramatically. Vacuum AFM opens up new classes of experiments, ranging from imaging of insulators with true atomic resolution to the measurement of forces between individual atoms.