Development of Scanning Thermal Microscopy with sub-nanometer lateral resolution

扫描热显微镜（SThM）是原子力显微镜（AFM）的一种变体，使用热敏感悬臂梁探针。由该悬臂探针产生的热量可用于研究纳米尺度的表面和器件的热阻率，以及用于制造可用于图案化半导体衬底和原型器件制造的几纳米半间距的掩模。该项目的主要目标是将IBM为“千足虫项目”开发的加热悬臂梁探针技术与我们在原子分辨率AFM仪器开发方面的专业知识相结合，以推动SThM的分辨率极限。我们达到了我们的目标，开发一个高分辨率的SThM操作在超高真空环境。

Scanning thermal microscopy (SThM) is a variant of atomic force microscopy (AFM) that uses a heat-sensing cantilever probe. The heat generated by this cantilever probe can be used to study the thermal resistivity of surfaces and devices at the nano scale, as well as for the fabrication of masks of a few nanometers half-pitch that can be used for the patterning semiconductor substrates and prototype device fabrication. The main goal of this project was to combine the heating cantilever probe technology developed by IBM for the "millipede project" with our expertise in the development of instrumentation for atomic resolution AFM to push the resolution limits of SThM. We reached our goal of developing a high-resolution SThM operative in UHV environment.