Novel Method for In-situ and Simultaneous Nano-friction and Nano-wear Characterization of Materials Running title: Novel Nanotribological Method Running Authors: Broitman and Florez-Ruiz

Nowadays there is an increased need to know the nanotribological properties of protective coatings used in part devices operating under nanoand micro-contact situations, e.g. hard disk drives, magnetic heads, micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS) and microsensors, etc. Therefore there is a demand for instruments and methods testing friction and wear at the nanoand micro-scales. In this work we present a new methodology to measure simultaneously the friction, and wear of a surface. We have designed an experiment where a probe is permanently scanning a 10 μm track in a reciprocal movement. Different loads are applied in order to obtain the topographic information which is used to calculate the wear rate and roughness evolution. Force lateral sensors register simultaneously the friction force variations. The