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:
Oct. 12, 1999
Filed:
Nov. 13, 1997
Hitachi Construction Machinery Co., Ltd., Tokyo, JP;
Abstract
This scanning probe microscope can accurately obtain information on surfaces of a sample when measuring the sample in a broad range from a slow scanning speed to a fast scanning speed. The scanning probe microscope comprises a cantilever (16) with a probe (15) at its tip, an optical lever mechanism (17,18) for measuring displacement of the cantilever (16), a mechanism for approaching/separating the cantilever against the sample, XY scanning circuit (21), and further comprises a Z axis piezoelectric element (14b) of a tripod for changing the distance between the cantilever and the sample, a control circuit (20) for controlling the distance between the cantilever and the sample to cause a displacement signal s1 obtained from the optical lever mechanism to be identical to a set value s0, and an adder (24) for adding a control signal from the control circuit and a signal based on the deviation between the displacement signal and the set value. The information on the sample surface is obtained from a signal outputted from the adder.