Ultrathin, high-sensitivity piezoresistive cantilevers were constructed using vapor-phase epitaxy to grow the conducting layer. A fourfold reduction in thickness was achieved over the thinnest implanted piezoresistive cantilevers, allowing improved force or displacement sensitivity and increased bandwidth. In cantilevers 890 Å thick, the dopant is well confined to the surface, and the sensitivity is 70% of the theoretical maximum. A cantilever fabricated for high force resolution has a minimum detectable force of 8.6 fN/Hz in air. Additionally, the 1/f noise is shown to follow the relation proposed by Hooge [Phys. Lett A 29, 139 (1969)], increasing in inverse proportion to the number of carriers.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.