PIEZOELECTRIC Pb(Zr, Ti)O₃ MICRO-DEVICES FOR SCANNING FORCE MICROSCOPY AND ULTRA-DENSITY DATA STORAGE

In this paper we report two types of micro devices based on Pb(Zr, Ti)O₃ (PZT) thin films for improving the throughput of scanning force microscopy (SFM) or data storage using SFM. One is a piezoelectric cantilever array integrated with force sensor as well as z-actuator on each cantilever for parallel operation. The 125-μm-long PZT micro cantilever with a natural resonant frequency of 189 kHz has a high actuation sensitivity of 75 nm/V. Independent parallel images using two cantilevers of the array were obtained. The other is a novel micro-SFM device that is expected to replace the cantilever, the deflection detection unit, and the macro-fabricated scanner which is the bottle neck limiting the single probe acquisition rate. The bridge-structured device has shown a microscopy sensitivity of 0.32 nA/nm in vertical direction and actuation abilities of 70-80nm/±V in the lateral direction.