A high-resolution measurement system for novel scanning thermal microscopy resistive nanoprobes

In this paper, a scanning thermal microscopy (SThM) module with a modified Wheatstone bridge is presented. It is intended to be used with a novel four-terminal thermoresistive nanoprobe, which was designed for performing thermal measurements in standard static-mode atomic force microscopes. The modified Wheatstone bridge architecture is also compared to a Wheatstone bridge and a Thomson bridge in terms of their temperature measurement sensitivities. In fixed conditions, they are found to be (7.05 ± 0.04) V K -1 for the modified Wheatstone, while (5.43 ± 0.06) V K-1 for the Wheatstone and (0.91 ± 0.09) V K-1 for the Thomson bridge. The usability of the three set-ups with four-terminal nanoprobes is also discussed. The design of devices included in the module is presented and the noise level of the modified Wheatstone bridge is estimated. A proportional-integral-derivative controller for active-mode SThM is also introduced.