Charging C60 islands with the AFM tip

We show that noncontact AFM (nc-AFM) and electrostatic force microscopy (EFM) can be used to transfer electrons on demand from the AFM tip into single bulk-like C60 islands, which are supported on the insulating NaCl(001) surface. Kelvin probe force microscopy (KPFM) helps to characterize the charge in C60 islands and their interaction with the NaCl support.

TEMPERATURE DEPENDENCE STUDY OF NONCONTACT AFM IMAGES USING MOLECULAR DYNAMICS SIMULATIONS

The effect of temperature on the noncontact atomic force microscopy (NC-AFM) surface imaging is investigated with the aid of molecular dynamics (MD) analysis based on the Sutton-Chen (SC) interatomic potential. Particular attention is devoted to the tip and sample flexibility at different temperatures. When a gold coated probe is brought close to the Au (001) surface at high temperatures, the tip and surface atoms are pulled together and their distance becomes smaller. The tip and sample atoms displacement varies in the different environment temperatures and this leads to the different interaction forces. Along this line, to study the effect of temperature on the resulting images, we have employed the well-known NC-AFM model and carried out realistic non-equilibrium MD 3D simulations of atomic scale imaging at different close approach positions to the surface.