Contact : A. Pailleret (E-mail : alain.pailleret@sorbonne-universite.fr)
Invented very soon after tunneling microscopy, atomic force microscopy is based on a measure of the interaction force between the tip and the surface. Its great advantage on the STM is that it can work on insulating substrates. It can also operate in an electrochemical environment. The measurement of the interaction between the tip and the surface is made by means of a laser that is reflected on the lever supporting the tip. A variant consists in fixing a tip on a quartz tuning fork (typically used in watchmaking) and measuring the perturbations on resonance induced during interaction with the surface. In addition, atomic force microscopy provides many other information in addition to topography: electrical conductivity, elasticity, friction, etc.