In this work, parametric noise squeezing and parametric resonance are realized through the use of an electronic feedback circuit to excite a microcantilever with a signal proportional to the product of the microcantilever's displacement and a harmonic signal. The cantilever's displacement is monitored using an optical lever technique. By adjusting the gain of an amplifier in the feedback circui...

We report the use of a SiN x based gold coated microcantilever array to quantitatively measure the activity and inhibition of a model protease immobilized on its surface. Trypsin was covalently bound to the gold surface of the microcantilever using a synthetic spacer, and the remaining exposed silicon nitride surface was passivated with silanated polyethylene glycol. The nanoscale cantilever mo...

The present work establishes the optimized spatial arrangement for an array of aligned microcantilever sensors placed inside a fluidic cell. The results of the present investigation show that the optimum spacing distance between the microcantilevers decreases as the fluidic cell height decreases. An increase in the flow Reynolds number is found to increase the optimum spacing distance. However,...

We demonstrate a method to control the distance between a custom probe and a sample on a μm to nm scale. The method relies on the closed-loop feedback on the angular deflection of an in-contact AFM microcantilever. High performance in stability and accuracy is achieved in this method by taking advantage of the small mechanical feedback path between surface and probe. We describe how internal er...

The Frequency Modulated Atomic Force Microscope (FM-AFM) is a powerful tool to perform surface investigation with true atomic resolution. The control system of the FM-AFM must keep constant both the frequency and amplitude of oscillation of the microcantilever during the scanning process of the sample. However, tip and sample interaction forces cause modulations in the microcantilever motion. A...

The nonlinear dynamic response of atomic force microscopy cantilevers tapping on a sample is discussed through theoretical, computational, and experimental analysis. Experimental measurements are presented for the frequency response of a specific microcantilever-sample system to demonstrate the nonlinear features, including multiple jump phenomena leading to reproducible hysteresis. We show tha...

Fluid-structural coupling occurs when microcantilever sensors vibrate in a fluid. Due to the complexity of the mechanical characteristics of microcantilevers and lack of high-precision microscopic mechanical testing instruments, effective methods for studying the fluid-structural coupling of microcantilevers are lacking, especially for non-rectangular microcantilevers. Here, we report fluid-str...

Characterization and Preliminary Demonstration of Microcantilever Array Integrated Sensors Ryan R. Anderson Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, BYU Doctor of Philosophy I characterize the behavior of microcantilever arrays which utilize the in-plane photonic transduction that I’ve previously developed and evaluate the performance of the microcantilever arrays in simple sensing sc...

Parametric resonance underpins the physics of swings, resonant surface waves, and particle traps. There is increasing interest in its potential applications in atomic force microscopy AFM . In this paper, the dynamics of parametrically resonant microcantilevers for high sensitivity imaging and force spectroscopy applications is investigated theoretically. Detailed numerical parametric-resonance...

The effect of the microcantilever inclination on analyte adhesion is numerically analyzed in this work. A generalized model for the analyte adhesion is considered based on wall shear stress (WSS) at the microcantilever surface. Several analytical solutions for special cases are obtained. It is found numerically that the total mass transfer is enhanced by increasing the adhesion rate, the Peclet...