Scanning tunneling microscopes (STMs) allow nanoscientists to see individual atoms.
This podcast is drawn from the "Virtual Lab" of WeCanFigureThisOut.org. This Virtual Lab uses 3D virtual reality animations to explain elect...
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Scanning Tunneling Microscope - How Nanoscientists see Atoms
This podcast is drawn from the "Virtual Lab" of WeCanFigureThisOut.org. This Virtual Lab uses 3D virtual reality animations to explain electronics, microelectronics and nanotechnology. This...
Episodes
16 episodesTo see how a Nanosurf easyScan STM works, let's take it apart in virtual reality.
This podcast is drawn from the "Virtual Lab" of WeCanFigureThisOut.org. This Virtual Lab uses 3D virtual reality animations to explain elect...
The heart of the STM is an atomically sharp probe.
This podcast is drawn from the "Virtual Lab" of WeCanFigureThisOut.org. This Virtual Lab uses 3D virtual reality animations to explain elect...
A voltage induces electrons to jump from the probe's tip to the sample atoms.
This podcast is drawn from the "Virtual Lab" of WeCanFigureThisOut.org. This Virtual Lab uses 3D virtual reality animations to explain elect...
A feedback loop holds the electron current constant by keeping the distance from probe to sample constant.
This podcast is drawn from the "Virtual Lab" of WeCanFigureThisOut.org. This Virtual Lab uses 3D virtual reality animations to explain elect...
But how can it move the probe over these tiny nanometer distances?
This podcast is drawn from the "Virtual Lab" of WeCanFigureThisOut.org. This Virtual Lab uses 3D virtual reality animations to explain elect...
Voltages to a piezoelectric crystal move the probe in and out.
This podcast is drawn from the "Virtual Lab" of WeCanFigureThisOut.org. This Virtual Lab uses 3D virtual reality animations to explain elect...
Another crystal moves it side to side.
This podcast is drawn from the "Virtual Lab" of WeCanFigureThisOut.org. This Virtual Lab uses 3D virtual reality animations to explain elect...
A third crystal moves it up and down.
This podcast is drawn from the "Virtual Lab" of WeCanFigureThisOut.org. This Virtual Lab uses 3D virtual reality animations to explain elect...
Let's see how these work together to create an atomic scale map of the sample surface.
This podcast is drawn from the "Virtual Lab" of WeCanFigureThisOut.org. This Virtual Lab uses 3D virtual reality animations to explain elect...
The voltage to the back crystal determines pixel color. Voltages on the other crystals move the probe and pixels side-to-side and up-and-down.
This podcast is drawn from the "Virtual Lab" of WeCanFigureThisOut.org. This Virtual Lab uses 3D virtual reality animations to explain elect...
But how do we first position the probe only a nanometer or so from the sample surface?
This podcast is drawn from the "Virtual Lab" of WeCanFigureThisOut.org. This Virtual Lab uses 3D virtual reality animations to explain elect...
It's done by ratcheting this cylinder in until an electron current is sensed.
This podcast is drawn from the "Virtual Lab" of WeCanFigureThisOut.org. This Virtual Lab uses 3D virtual reality animations to explain elect...
This STM is so simple that we use it in UVA classes. But it also earned two physicists the Nobel Prize in 1986.
This podcast is drawn from the "Virtual Lab" of WeCanFigureThisOut.org. This Virtual Lab uses 3D virtual reality animations to explain elect...
All of the scenes together
This podcast is drawn from the "Virtual Lab" of WeCanFigureThisOut.org. This Virtual Lab uses 3D virtual reality animations to explain elect...
This podcast is drawn from the Virtual Lab presentations of WeCanFigureThisOut.org. The copyrighted material of this site was developed under funding from National Science Foundation CCLI, NIRT, MRSEC and NUE programs. This project is led by John C. Bean
This podcast is drawn from the "Virtual Lab" of WeCanFigureThisOut.org. This Virtual Lab uses 3D virtual reality animations to explain elect...