NANOSENSORS PPP-NCHAu and PPP-FMAu AFM tips were used in the research for this interesting paper
Derek Novak et al.
Nanoscale chemical imaging by photoinduced force microscopy
Science Advances 25 Mar 2016
Vol. 2, no. 3, e1501571
DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.1501571
This work is licensed under CC BY-NC (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0)
Abstract
Correlating spatial chemical information with the morphology of closely packed nanostructures remains a challenge for the scientific community. For example, supramolecular self-assembly, which provides a powerful and low-cost way to create nanoscale patterns and engineered nanostructures, is not easily interrogated in real space via existing nondestructive techniques based on optics or electrons. A novel scanning probe technique called infrared photoinduced force microscopy (IR PiFM) directly measures the photoinduced polarizability of the sample in the near field by detecting the time-integrated force between the tip and the sample. By imaging at multiple IR wavelengths corresponding to absorption peaks of different chemical species, PiFM has demonstrated the ability to spatially map nm-scale patterns of the individual chemical components of two different types of self-assembled block copolymer films. With chemical-specific nanometer-scale imaging, PiFM provides a powerful new analytical method for deepening our understanding of nanomaterials.
Please follow this external link for the full article http://advances.sciencemag.org/content/2/3/e1501571.full
Core-shell star block copolymers with hydrophobic polystyrene (PS) cores and hydrophilic polymethaacrylate arms (shell section) attached to the PS core. Images courtesy of Molecular Vista. A NANOSENSORS PPP-NCHAu AFM tip was used for this application. These images are not part of the above mentioned article but a further illustration of the possiblities.