New design of a variable-temperature ultrahigh vacuum scanning tunneling microscope

Abstract

We present the design of a variable-temperature ultrahigh vacuum ͑UHV͒ scanning tunneling microscope which can be operated between 20 and 400 K. The microscope is mounted directly onto the heat exchanger of a He continuous flow cryostat without vibration isolation inside the UHV chamber. The coarse approach is performed with an inertial slider driven by the same piezo tube that is also used for scanning. The performance of the instrument is demonstrated by two different kinds of measurements: First we show topographic images of close packed metal surfaces with atomic resolution. Then, we present results from scanning tunneling spectroscopy measurements on WSe 2 under illumination at variable temperatures.

A Compact and Versatile Scanning Tunnelling Microscope with High Energy Resolution for Use in a 3He Cryostat

“…18 For good thermalization all other parts are machined from copper. As shown by Mugele et al 19 but with a magnetic slip stick mechanism and Kleindiek and Herrmann et al, 20 a very low-mass of movable parts results in a high resonance frequency. Following the idea of low-mass design we use a modified design of Renner et al 21 which has a low-mass slider that carries the tip.…”

Compact design of a transmission electron microscope-scanning tunneling microscope holder with three-dimensional coarse motion

“…The compact design ensures vibrational isolation 13,14 and minimizes the need for external vibrational damping, thus retaining atomic scale resolution in both TEM and STM imaging modes.…”

Quartz tuning fork-based conductive atomic force microscope with glue-free solid metallic tips

“…In order to overcome these difficulties, we devised a new header system, inspired by pervious work [27,28], for positioning the tip in physical contact with the QTF prong in a fixed and stable way. In the system, the input/output electrical signals for AFM-QTF control and current acquisition are independent.…”