In 1971, NIST physicist Russell Young built a pioneering microscope with near atomic resolution. His Topografiner demonstrated the operating principle for the scanning tunneling microscope (STM), now widely used to study surfaces. IBM scientists received the Nobel Prize for the first STM, and the Nobel committee cited Young for critical contributions. Other NIST advances in microscopy have given researchers better tools for studying the chemical, magnetic, and electrical properties of materials.

NIST STM image made in 1996