The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Sep. 02, 1997
Filed:
Apr. 01, 1996
Applicant:
Inventor:
Khaled Karrai, Munich, DE;
Assignee:
Primary Examiner:
Int. Cl.
CPC ...
G01B / ;
U.S. Cl.
CPC ...
356384 ; 25055924 ;
Abstract
A method and apparatus for determining the optical aperture diameter `d` of tips suitable for use in near-field scanning optical microscopy (NSOM). Several functional relationships are found between the far-field angular intensity distribution function I(.theta.) for light of wavelength `.lambda.` emitted out of the aperture, the angle `.theta.` being that formed between the direction of travel of the photon concerned and the perpendicular to the plane of the aperture. It is found that I(.theta.) depends sensitively on the aperture `d`. In one embodiment tip diameters can be measured for diameters in the range of .lambda./6<d<.lambda..