The quality (Q) factor is an important parameter of the resonance of the microcantilever as it determines both imaging bandwidth and force sensitivity. The ability to control the Q factor of multiple modes is believed to be of great benefit for atomic force microscopy techniques involving multiple eigenmodes. In this paper, we propose a novel cantilever design employing multiple piezoelectric transducers which are used for separated actuation and sensing, leading to guaranteed collocation of the first eight eigenmodes up to 3 MHz. The design minimizes the feedthrough usually observed with these systems by incorporating a guard trace on the cantilever chip. As a result, a multimode Q controller is demonstrated to be able to modify the quality factor of the first two eigenmodes over up to four orders of magnitude without sacrificing robust stability.
History
Journal title
Review of Scientific Instruments
Volume
88
Issue
15 August 2017
Article number
86109
Publisher
AIP Publishing
Language
en, English
College/Research Centre
Faculty of Engineering and Built Environment
School
School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science