Noncontact atomic force microscopy imaging of ultrathin Al2O3 on NiAl(110) -: art. no. 201401

Noncontact atomic force microscopy (NC-AFM) has been used to image ultrathin film Al2O3 on NiAl(110). Atomic scale rows were observed with a 9 A periodicity. This provides support for a previous scanning tunneling microscopy study that concluded that the rows arise from the oxide rather than the underlying substrate. NC-AFM data image domain boundaries in the oxide film as either trenches or ridges, depending on the state of the tip. This suggests that NC-AFM does not simply trace the topography of the surface.