Fabrication of high aspect ratio AFM probes with diamond apex

原子力显微镜(AFM)是一种广泛用于纳米尺度表征的工具，在IBM、英特尔、AMD和希捷等大型半导体公司中广泛应用，以确保其芯片和小型电子产品的质量。它还被广泛应用于各种研究领域和新兴技术。原子力显微镜最重要的部分是探头或尖端，它“感觉”到样品表面，并创建样品表面的三维图像。AFM使用的一个主要缺点是其一次性探头的使用寿命太长，这是定义图像分辨率和质量的主要组件。传统上，这些探头是由硅制成的；但由于硅的机械性能较差，一些制造商已转向其他替代品，如氮化硅、碳纳米管和金刚石涂层硅探头。尽管这些探头显示出比常规硅探头更长的寿命，但它们的价格要高得多。在这个项目中，我们将开发一种低成本制造高深宽比金刚石原子力显微镜探头的方法。我们计划使用电子束光刻技术从SOI晶片中制造这些探头，比用聚焦离子束球磨制造的高深宽比金刚石尖端的制造成本要低得多。我们的尖端也将比通过在硅尖上涂上一层钻石薄膜制成的钻石尖端要锋利得多。我们将提高重复性，以简化该产品的批量生产过程。

A widely used tool in nano-scale characterization is the Atomic Force Microscope (AFM), with popular applications in large semiconductor companies such as IBM, Intel, AMD and Seagate for the quality assurance of their chips and small electronics. It is also widely used in a variety of research fields and emerging technologies. The most important part of the AFM is the probe or tip which "feels" the sample surface and creates a three-dimensional image of the specimen surface. A major drawback in AFM usage is the lifetime of its disposable probe which is the main component in defining the resolution and quality of the images. Conventionally, these probes are made of silicon; but due to poor mechanical properties of silicon, some manufacturers have switched to other alternatives such as silicon nitride, carbon nanotubes, and diamond coated silicon probes. Although these probes have shown a longer lifetime than the regular silicon probes, they are significantly more expensive. In this project, we will develop a method to fabricate high aspect ratio diamond AFM probes at low cost. We plan to employ electron beam lithography to fabricate these probes from SOI wafers, with significantly reduced fabrication cost than high aspect ratio diamond tips made by focused ion beam milling. Our tip apex will also be considerably sharper than diamond tips made by coating a diamond film onto a silicon tip. We will increase the reproducibility to streamline the batch manufacturing process for this product.