Shear force microscopy with a nanoscale resolution

This paper presents a shear force microscope having a nanometric resolution at high scan rates. Current techniques were reviewed and tested, and a design based on the use of a tuning fork is described. The use of a low quality factor enabled us to decrease the response time and increase the stability of the tracking. The microscope was coupled with a tunneling current detection, in order to study the interactions between the sample and the probe during scanning. As an example, a sharp nickel nanotip was used to image a gold surface, showing details down to a few nanometers, even at scanning rates of 4 Hz.