Hybrid optical fiber-apertured cantilever near-field probe

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Abstract
In this letter, we propose a hybrid optical fiber-apertured cantilever probe for optical near-field applications. A thermal SiO 2 cantilever beam with a SiO 2 pyramidal tip was formed by Si micromachining technique and bonded with an optical fiber using a polyimide adhesive layer. A subwavelength aperture at the apex of the SiO 2 tip was formed by etching the SiO 2 in a buffered-HF solution. Optical near-field imaging in contact mode was observed with the fabricated probe. The probe could work in contact mode because the cantilever at the end of the fiber can flexibly move on the sample surface. By detecting the far-field light which is reflected-back by the tip of the cantilever, the vibration of the cantilever was observed using the probe itself. With the proposed structure, a hybrid fiber bundle-apertured cantilever array is feasible for application in parallel near-field processing or data storage.