HIGH RESOLUTION PROBES FOR NANO IR AND TERS

Outstanding performance in your nano-FTIR, s-SNOM, AFM-IR and Tip Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy measurements

NANOSPECTROSCOPY TIPS MORPHOLOGY

Next-Tip Ltd. has patented a new morphology of the metallic coating on an AFM probe.

Our nanofabrication process is based on the deposition of nanoparticles to create nanostructures.

The control of the deposition of these nanoparticles creates on the tip a new morphology different from those found in the literature. This morphology is characterized by the following features:

coating nanoparticles nano-IR AFM-IR nano-FTIR S-SNOM Scattering SNOM Next-tip
nanoparticles coating Apex metal Tip enhanced Raman Spectroscopy TERS

Apex features

Widening at the apex

The apex of our tips is an irregular nanostructure formed by an aggregate of gold nanoparticles with a shape similar to an ‘artichoke’. This morphology provides enough metal to enhance the LSPR effect.

Apex nanoparticles coating metal Tip enhanced Raman Spectroscopy TERS probe
nanoparticles sharp tip lightning rod effect high resolution TERS probe

Very sharp tip apex

The nanostructure formed at the apex, terminated by one nanoparticle, gives extremely high sharpness to the probe (up to 3nm). This nanoparticle provides high lateral resolution and increases the lightning rod effect.

coating of nanoparticles forms branch-shape effective plamonic antena SEM image

Morphology of the coating

The dense coating of nanoparticles creates branch-like structures along the tip surface incresing its roughness. This heterogeneity of the coating acts as an effective plasmonic antenna to receive and transmit light at the nanoscale.

coating of nanoparticles forms branch-shape effective plamonic antena
coating of nanoparticles forms branch-shape effective plamonic antena

We have control over the coating in terms of:

  • The material composition (Au, Ag, etc.)
  • The size and density of nanoparticles
  • The material aggregation at the apex and tip sides:
    • Size of the artichoke
    • The length and thickness of the nanobranches

This allows for increasing the spectroscopic signal (fostering antenna effects, spatial resolution, SNR and sensitivity), to enable cutting-edge experiments

morphology nanoparticle coating tip Next-tip

We can perform our coating with reproducibility on different kind of probes: tip’s shape, spring constants, etc.

Elephant-trunk tip shape probe

Elephant trunk

Pyramid tip shape probe

Pyramid

OPUS OTESPA OLTESPA SEM image coating nanoparticle

OPUS

ARROW PROBE SEM image coating nanoparticles

Arrow

Which one do you want to know?

high resolution probe TERS Next-tip nanoparticles coating

TERS PROBES

nano-IR AFM-IR nano-FTIR S-SNOM Scattering SNOM Next-tip near-field phase

nano-IR PROBES