Fabrication of monolithic diamond probes for scanning probe microscopy applications

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Abstract
A process relying on the molding technique for the fabrication of diamond cantilevers with diamond tips integrated on silicon wafers for scanning probe microscopy applications is described. Either hot filament or microwave CVD diamond deposition and standard techniques of silicon micro-machining are employed. The deposition of well- developed tips depends critically on the pretreatment applied to enhance nucleation density; abrasive treatment with diamond powder as well as the bias-enhanced nucleation turned out to be successful. With optimized processes, well- shaped tips with a radius of curvature in the order of 30 nm can be obtained. They consist of high quality diamond according to micro-Raman spectroscopy. The definition of the cantilever area is another critical step which can be solved by proper process design. The fabrication of conductive tips/cantilevers is possible by boron doping. Finally, first performance tests of the diamond tips and cantilevers are presented.

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