Gates, R.
(2017),
Experimental Confirmation of the Atomic Force Microscope Cantilever Stiffness Tilt Correction, Review of Scientific Instruments, [online], https://doi.org/10.1063/1.4986201, https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=921131
(Accessed November 26, 2025)
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Experimental Confirmation of the Atomic Force Microscope Cantilever Stiffness Tilt Correction
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Abstract
The tilt angle (angle of repose) of an AFM cantilever relative to the surface it is interrogating affects the effective stiffness of the cantilever as it analyzes the surface. For typical cantilevers that incline from 10 to 15° tilt, this is thought to be a 3 % to 7 % stiffness increase correction. While the theoretical geometric analysis of this effect may have reached a consensus that it varies with Cos-2 theta, there is very little experimental evidence to confirm this using AFM cantilevers. Recently, the laser Doppler vibrometry Thermal calibration method utilized at NIST has demonstrated sufficient stiffness calibration accuracy and precision to allow a definitive experimental confirmation of the particular trigonometric form of this tilt effect using a commercial microfabricated AFM cantilever specially modified to allow strongly tilted (up to 15°) effective cantilever stiffness measurements.Citation
Review of Scientific Instruments
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Created December 14, 2017, Updated September 29, 2025