OMCL-TR400PSA Discontinued

OMCL-TR400PSA-HW / 245 chips, Reflex side gold coating
OMCL-TR400PSA-1 / 34 chips, Reflex side gold coating

11/34 kHz, 0.02/0.08 N/m

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for DC (contact) mode AFM and LFM

Catalog number

Small quantily unit wafer unit
34 chips/unit 245 chips/wafer
Soft type OMCL-TR400PSA-1 OMCL-TR400PSAHW
  34 chips/unit 490 chips/wafer
Standard type OMCL-TR800PSA-1 OMCL-TR800PSA-W
  34 chips/unit 490 chips/wafer
LFM type OMCL-RC800PSA-1 OMCL-RC800PSA-W

OLYMPUS pyramidal tip (below) is stably sharpened by our special fabrication process, and its small radius of the tip are achieved. OLYMPUS introduced this type of the tip in the first time in the world in 1991. You never doubt this type of the tip becomes standard for contact mode AFM measurements.
The tips are made of silicon nitride, which is less prone to wear than single-crystal silicon. This helps to minimize image changes caused by wear of the tip.

SEM image of sharpened pyramidal tip

SEM image of pyramidal tip

Tip

Below is an SEM image of a sharpened pyramidal tip (side view). As can be seen in the picture, the pyramidal tip is sharpened toward the tip apex.

Top of the pyramidal tip

  • Tip shape : sharpened square pyramidal (hollow tip)
  • Tip height : 2.9 µm
  • Tip radius : less than 20 nm (15 nm (typ.))
  • Tip angle (face to face) : 25 - 45 deg. (top to around 300nm down)
  • Tip material : silicon nitride (*)

Dimensions of levers

Cantilevers of OMCL-TR series

design of OMCL-TR

Two pairs of different shapes of triangular cantilevers protrude from both sides of a glass chip.
Lever thickness:
400nm and 800nm

Cantilevers of OMCL-RC series

design of OMCL-RC

Four different shapes of rectangular cantilevers protrude from a glass chip.
Lever thickness:
800nm

Metal coating

[Reflex coating]

Thin gold/chromium film is coated on the back side of the cantilevers for reflecting light from a deflection sensor in the AFM equipment. Transparency of the lever with reflex coating for visible light is 1% or less.

Dimensions of chips (substrates)

design of chip

Number of chips in a cantilever strip : 34 chips + 2 extra chip

Either triangular or rectangular cantilevers extend from a glass chip. Each chip is connected at the bottom of the glass chip and makes a chip array (call it "cantilever strip"). The left illustration shows a part of the array of rectangular cantilever chips.

Mechanical properties of levers and tips

Stiffness [N/m] and resonant frequency [Hz] of each cantileves are Calculated values under the vacuum condition, or no-damping condition.


 Lever Tip
thickness
(nm)		 length
(µm)		 width
(µm)		 spring const.
(N/m)		 resonant freq.
(kHz)		 height
(µm)		 radius
(nm)
Triangular cantilever with reflect coating
OMCL-TR400PSA- 400 100
200 		* 0.08
0.02 		34
11 		2.9 15
OMCL-TR800PSA- 800 100
200 		* 0.57
0.15 		73
24 		2.9 15
Rectangular cantilever with reflect coating
OMCL-RC800PSA- 800 100
100
200
200 		20
40
20
40 		0.39
0.76
0.05
0.10 		69
71
18
19 		2.9 15

note:
The resonant frequency of each of the cantilevers shift lower in water than in vacuum or in air because of the water damping. For instance in OMCL-TR400PSA-, the resonant frequencies of the 100µm and 200µm long cantilevers shift around 7kHz and 3kHz in water respectively.

Applications

  • Contact mode AFM operation
    We recommend OMCL-TR800PSA- as a general choice for contact mode operation. OMCL-TR400PSA- must be selected when the sample is easy to damage.
  • Contact mode LFM/AFM operation
    OMCL-RC800PSA- is for the LFM measurement because the twist motion of rectangular cantilever is simpler than that of triangular cantilever.
  • AC mode AFM in fluid.
    The 100µm long cantilever of the OMCL-TR400PSA- is also recommended for AC mode AFM in fluid. (See a sample image.)

Miscellaneous

FAQs about the cantilevers this page (here).

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