B - St. Cloud State University

Ryan’s MFP-3D Procedural Operation ‘Manualette’ Version 10 (v080501; Igor 6.04A); 5.4
The thermal tune is also a very convenient way to check whether the SLD spot is on the cantilever
(when aligning SLD via IR card, sometimes a nice sum is given when the spot is on the probe
substrate).
▪ Figure 5.6 (right) shows and example of a thermal
tune when the SLD was on the back of the probe chip,
yet a reasonable Sum voltage was displayed in the
S&D meter.
Figure 5.6: Thermal tune of SLD spot on back of probe
chip - no apparent cantilever resonant frequency.
▪ Figure 5.7 shows two cases in which a thermal tune can tell you what has happened if the resonant
frequency changes throughout an imaging experiment. If the tip breaks (lowering mass, increasing f o ; Figure
5.7A), or if there is an increase in mass on the cantilever/ tip from adhered debris (lowering f o ; Figure 5.7B).
A
B
Figure 5.7: SEM images of compromised tips: A) broken tip, will shift f o to higher value;
B) debris on tip will add mass, shift f o to lower value.