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:
Jun. 24, 2003
Filed:
Mar. 17, 2001
Clayton C. Williams, Salt Lake City, UT (US);
University of Utah Research Foundation, Salt Lake City, UT (US);
Abstract
The present invention develops a new type of SPM, a scanning tunneling charge transfer microscope (STCTM). The STCTM is capable of first, detecting the transfer of an ultrasmall amount of charge (single electrons) or current (attoampere) into or out from a surface with atomic resolution and second, simultaneously measuring the electronic response of that surface to the transferred charge. This dual capability can be achieved by appropriately combining the virtues of the STM and a modified EFM. The STM provides the atomic resolution for the charge transfer, while the modified EFM provides the sub-electronic charge sensitivity for the current and charge detection. The STCTM, with sensitivity many orders of magnitude better than with SPM technology currently available, can be used to characterize the properties of molecules, ultrathin oxides, insulator surfaces, and clusters on insulators with atomic resolution.