Renishaw couples Raman microscope with Bruker AFM
Renishaw, a supplier of integrated Raman-AFM solutions, has announced that it now supports Bruker's Dimension Icon AFM. According to Renishaw, combining inVia's chemical imaging capabilities with Dimension Icon provides a fully integrated Raman-AFM system that supports a full range of AFM techniques and µ-Raman capabilities that delivers high-performance surface characterisation with efficiency and ease.
Raman spectroscopy is a method for understanding growth mechanisms of compound semiconductors, including SiC. It can investigate stress/strain, identify the origin of defects, determine different polytypes and reveal carrier levels. Coupling it with atomic force microscopy (AFM) results in a powerful hybrid technique that can characterise the properties of SiC at sub-micrometre and nanometre scales.
Bruker's Dimension Icon AFM is designed to offer the flexibility to perform nearly every AFM measurement type, at high resolution. According to Renishaw, the inVia microscope complements this by producing rich, detailed, chemical images and highly specific Raman data from discrete points. Users can make both Raman and AFM measurements without moving their samples between instruments and without compromising performance. In addition, if necessary, both instruments can be used independently.
The inVia-Icon combination has a flexible arm linking the two instruments; this couples light between the two with mirrors, providing a higher efficiency than fibre optic coupling. This ensures users can acquire high quality data in the minimum time, with market-leading signal-to-noise levels.
The flexible coupling arm employs Renishaw's StreamLineHR high resolution mapping technology. It can Raman map areas up to 500 µm x 500 µm, with position encoders ensuring 100 nm repeatability. Bruker's proprietary PeakForce QNM complements StreamLineHR by providing even higher resolution nano-mechanical information.
"Renishaw's patented sampling arm allows the sample to be measured while it is still mounted on the AFM; making correlated measurements with both systems is easy," said Tim Batten, Renishaw applications scientist. He added, "The arm does not contact the AFM and, as such, does not affect its performance."
