Conducting Tip Atomic Force Microscopy
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Overview
Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM)is a well established process for visualizing ultrafine surface characteristics. In normal AFM scanning mode a fine needle is drawn very near a surface and is gently bent by the various atomic forces. The conducting tip gives you the chance to measure electrical conductivity at discrete locations and then correlate these measurement with the surface scan that reveals the shape.
see Wikipedia Atomic Force Microscopy
Operation
<swf width="640" height="452">http://depts.washington.edu/cmditr/media/afm.swf</swf>
Signficance
This is of particular interest to the field of photonics research because the structure of thin coatings has a huge effect on the performance of devices.