Scanning Near-Field Optical Microscopy (SNOM) is a member of scanning probe microscopes (SPMs) family which enables nanostructure investigation of the surfaces on a wide range of materials. In fact, SNOM combines the SPM technology to the optical microscopy and in this way provide a powerful tool to study nano-structures with very high spatial resolution. In this paper, a qualified overview of ...

Scanning Near-Field Optical Microscopy (SNOM) is a member of scanning probe microscopes (SPMs) family which enables nanostructure investigation of the surfaces on a wide range of materials. In fact, SNOM combines the SPM technology to the optical microscopy and in this way provide a powerful tool to study nano-structures with very high spatial resolution. In this paper, a qualified overview of ...

scanning near-field optical microscopy (snom) is a member of scanning probe microscopes (spms) family which enables nanostructure investigation of the surfaces on a wide range of materials. in fact, snom combines the spm technology to the optical microscopy and in this way provide a powerful tool to study nano-structures with very high spatial resolution. in this paper, a qualified overview of ...

This thesis is concerned with the use of the scanning near-field optical microscope (SNOM) to pattern and image conjugated polymer structures. The SNOM is one of just a few optical instruments which are capable of breaking the diffraction limit which limits conventional microscopes to a resolution of approximately half a wavelength. It does so by directing light onto a sub-wavelength aperture a...

The method of fluorescence resonance energy transfer scanning near-field optical microscopy (FRET SNOM) consists in the separation of a FRET pair between an SNOM tip and a sample. The donor (or acceptor) centre is located at the tip apex and scanned in the vicinity of a sample while acceptor fluorescence (or donor-fluorescence quenching) is detected. It is shown that the spatial resolution for ...

A scanning near-field optical microscope (SNOM) is a powerful tool to investigate optical effects that are smaller than Abbe’s limit. Its greatest strength is the simultaneous measurement of high-resolution topography and optical near-field data that can be correlated to each other. However, the resolution of an aperture SNOM is always limited by the probe. It is a technical challenge to fabric...

In this article, we present an overview of aperture and apertureless type scanning near-field optical microscopy (SNOM) techniques that have been developed, with a focus on three-dimensional (3D) SNOM methods. 3D SNOM has been undertaken to image the local distribution (within ~100 nm of the surface) of the electromagnetic radiation scattered by random and deterministic arrays of metal nanostru...

Scanning Near-field Optical Microscopy (SNOM) is the leading instrument used to image optical fields on the nanometer scale. A metal-coating is typically applied to SNOM probes to define a subwavelength aperture and minimize optical leakage, but the presence of such coatings in the near field of the sample can often cause a substantial change in the sample emission properties. For the first tim...

A reflection-mode aperture-type scanning near-field optical microscope ~R-SNOM! based on the external collection of the reflected light is presented. The light detection is based on an elliptical mirror setup, with the tip and sample at one focus, and a photomultiplier tube at the other. Results are presented on the general imaging properties of this microscope. The results presented concentrat...