A microcantilever heater-thermometer with a thermal isolation layer for making thermal nanotopography measurements

Zhenting Dai, Elise A. Corbin, William Paul King

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

This paper presents a microcantilever having a microscale heater-thermometer fabricated from doped single crystal silicon that is mounted on a silicon nitride thermal isolation structure. The silicon nitride isolation structure is in turn connected to doped single crystal silicon legs. The cantilever fabrication, its characterization, and its application in thermal nanotopography measurements are presented in this work. The cantilever can reach temperatures over 600 °C with a heating power of 4mW. The cantilever has a thermal resistance that exceeds 105KW-1 when away from a substrate. Making a contact-mode scan over a silicon calibration grating of height 20nm, the cantilever has a topography reading sensitivity of 1.3 × 10-4nm-1, and a topography reading resolution of about 7pm Hz-1/2. These performance characteristics compare extremely well to published ones for other kinds of cantilevers.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Article number055503
JournalNanotechnology
Volume21
Issue number5
DOIs
StatePublished - 2010

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • General Chemistry
  • Mechanics of Materials
  • Mechanical Engineering
  • Bioengineering
  • Electrical and Electronic Engineering
  • General Materials Science

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