We demonstrate unambiguously that the field enhancement near the apex of a laser-illuminated silicon tip decays according to a power law that is moderated by a single parameter characterizing the tip sharpness. Oscillating the probe in intermittent contact with a semiconductor nanocrystal strongly modulates the fluorescence excitation rate, providing robust optical contrast and enabling excellent background rejection. Laterally encoded demodulation yields images with <10 nm spatial resolution, consistent with independent measurements of tip sharpness

Gerton, Jordan M.

Lessard, Guillaume A.

Ma, Z.

Quake, Stephen R.

Wade, Lawrence A.

English

Caltech Authors - Main

Tip-Enhanced Fluorescence Microscopy at 10 Nanometer Resolution

VOLUME 93, NUMBER 18 P H Y S I C A L R E V I E W L E T T E R S
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29 OCTOBER 2004Tip-Enhanced Fluorescence Microscopy at 10 Nanometer Resolution
Jordan M. Gerton,* Lawrence A. Wade, Guillaume A. Lessard, Z. Ma, and Stephen R. Quake
Department of Applied Physics, California Institute of Technology, MC 128-95, Pasadena, California 91125, USA
(Received 12 December 2003; published 28 October 2004)180801-1We demonstrate unambiguously that the field enhancement near the apex of a laser-illuminated
silicon tip decays according to a power law that is moderated by a single parameter characterizing the
tip sharpness. Oscillating the probe in intermittent contact with a semiconductor nanocrystal strongly
modulates the fluorescence excitation rate, providing robust optical contrast and enabling excellent
background rejection. Laterally encoded demodulation yields images with <10 nm spatial resolution,
consistent with independent measurements of tip sharpness.
DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.93.180801 PACS numbers: 07.79.Fc, 42.50.Hz, 61.46.+w, 78.67.BfThe potential of near-field microscopy to optically
resolve structure well below the diffraction limit has
excited physicists, chemists, and biologists for almost
20 years. Conventional near-field scanning optical mi-
croscopy (NSOM) uses the light forced through a small
metal aperture to locally excite or detect an optical re-
sponse. The spatial resolution in NSOM is limited to 30–
50 nm by the penetration depth of light into the metal
aperture. More recently, apertureless-NSOM (ANSOM)
techniques were developed which leverage the strong
enhancement of an externally applied optical field at the
apex of a sharp tip for local excitation of the sample [1–
11]. The promised advantage of ANSOM is that spatial
resolution should be limited only by tip sharpness (typi-
cally 10 nm). The resolution in most previous ANSOM
experiments, however, was at best marginally better than
NSOM and was inferior to expectations based on tip
sharpness alone. Further, the external field used to induce
enhancement led to a substantial background signal and
to assertions that one-photon fluorescence is not appro-
priate for ANSOM [12,13]. These experiments fell short
of their potential because they maintained a tip-sample
gap of several nanometers, and thus did not thoroughly
exploit the tightly confined enhancement.
Here, we demonstrate an ANSOM technique that fully
exploits the available contrast and leads to spatial resolu-
tion that is limited only by tip sharpness. The problems
associated with a tip-sample gap are overcome by oscil-
lating the probe in intermittent contact with the sample.
The detected signal is then composed of a modulated
near-field portion that is superimposed on the far-field
background. Subsequent demodulation decouples the two
components and thus strongly elevates the near-field sig-
nal relative to the background. With this technique, we
measured <10 nm lateral resolution via one-photon fluo-
rescence imaging of isolated quantum dots, consistent
with independent measurements of tip sharpness. The
measured resolution is >3 times better than previous
reports for quantum dots using one-photon fluorescence
[8,9], and is 2 times better than previous measurements0031-9007=04=93(18)=180801(4)$22.50 using higher-order optical processes (two-photon fluores-
cence [6], Raman scattering [4,5]) despite predictions to
the contrary [12,13].
To better understand the advantages of this technique
and to facilitate development of accurate physical models,
it is crucial to rigorously characterize the spatial confine-
ment of the enhancement effect. Previous investigations
did not attain the level of precision necessary to differ-
entiate between various theoretical models [4,7,14] and
there was no experimental or theoretical consensus re-
garding either the functionality or the set of parameters
governing the spatial confinement [12,15–18]. In this
Letter, we show unambiguously that the enhancement
decays strictly according to a power-law functionality
moderated by a single parameter that characterizes the
tip sharpness. The collective results shown here will
impact not only nano-optics research, but also the appli-
cation of ANSOM to a wide range of nanoscale systems at
the interface between physics, biology, and chemistry.
Our instrument combines a custom optical layout with
a commercial (Digital Instruments Bioscope) atomic
force microscope (AFM). The excitation laser beam is fo-
cused through a glass coverslip (spot size: 3501000 nm)
using a 1.3 N.A. oil-immersion objective lens. The objec-
tive simultaneously collects fluorescence, which is then
directed onto an avalanche photodiode through a system
of spectral filters (background rejection-ratio 1010 : 1).
A beam-shaping mask is inserted into the excitation
beam to generate a purely evanescent field above the glass
interface (decay length: 120–250 nm) with a large po-
larization component along the probe axis [19] as re-
quired for field enhancement [15,20]. The focal spot is
aligned with the AFM probe by means of a piezoactuated
tip-tilt mirror, and the lateral position of the probe is
controlled by closed-loop feedback. Uncorrected residual
drift (0:05–0:2 nm=s) is the dominant source of uncer-
tainty in the probe position.
The silicon AFM probe oscillates [21] with a typical
peak-peak amplitude of 30–40 nm, assuring tip-sample
contact at closest approach. In contrast, previous work2004 The American Physical Society 180801-1
VOLUME 93, NUMBER 18 P H Y S I C A L R E V I E W L E T T E R S
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29 OCTOBER 2004used very small oscillations (1 nm) [7,8] or shear-force
feedback [4,6,10,14] to maintain a tip-sample gap of
several nanometers. Data are recorded to a computer
disk in the form of two independent streams of time
stamps: one that marks the arrival time of each detected
photon, and one that marks a particular phase in each
probe-oscillation cycle. Because the raw data are stored
permanently in a lossless digital format, multiple analysis
algorithms can be applied without degrading the signal.
Samples are prepared by drying a dilute solution of
CdSe-ZnS core-shell quantum dots onto a clean glass
coverslip. The dots have a mean diameter of 5 nm and
an emission spectrum centered near   600 nm. The
fluorescence rate is highly dynamic, exhibiting ‘‘blink-
ing’’ and sudden changes in quantum yield (QY), in
agreement with previous observations [8,22,23]. When a
quantum dot is ‘‘on’’ and in a high QY state, a typical
count rate of2 104 sec1 is measured with300 nW
of illumination power.
To determine which parameters influence the tip-
enhanced intensity distribution we measure the induced
fluorescence rate as a function of tip-sample separation
(z). The focal spot and AFM probe are centered on an
isolated dot and the photon and probe-oscillation data
streams are recorded for several seconds. A histogram
of the phase delay () between the arrival time of each
photon and the preceding probe-oscillation time stamp is
computed. Each value of  is then mapped to the corre-
sponding value of z to produce an approach curve (Fig. 1).
Each approach curve is a convolution of the tip-enhanced
intensity distribution and the excitation-probability dis-FIG. 1. Enhancement near a sharp silicon probe. Approach
curves for a 5 nm diameter quantum dot (solid circles), a 5
20 nm CdSe-ZnS nanorod (open squares), and a 20 nm diame-
ter dye-doped latex sphere (open triangles). Additional ap-
proach curves extending to z 150 nm (not shown) were flat
beyond the enhancement region. The vertical scale is normal-
ized to the count rate for a retracted probe. 10% uncertainties in
the horizontal and vertical scales originate from calibration of
the probe-oscillation amplitude and noise in the normalization
factor, respectively. The lines connect the data points. Inset:
Histogram of phase delays for the quantum dot.
180801-2tribution within the target. Thus, the fluorescence decays
to half its peak value at larger z for increasing target size:
1.7, 4.3, and 6.3 nm for the quantum dot, nanorod, and
sphere, respectively. Because of the convolution, the half-
maximum at z  1:7 nm for the quantum dot represents
an upper limit for the spatial confinement of the tip-
enhanced intensity profile. This value is several times
smaller than previous measurements for either silicon
[7] or metal [4,6,10,14] tips.
The fluorescence count rate is enhanced by a factor of
19 for the quantum dot, a factor of 3 for the nanorod, and
a factor of 4 for the 20 nm diameter fluorescent sphere.
Previous measurements that used silicon tips showed less
than a fivefold increase for quantum dots [8,9] and less
than a 50% increase for 20 nm spheres [7]. Further, those
experiments were complicated by interference effects
that yielded a net suppression of the signal relative to the
fluorescence background. An additional experiment used
a modified aperture-type near-field tip and showed evi-
dence of enhancement that was difficult to quantify [14].
Figure 2 plots each approach curve from Fig. 1 on a log-
log scale. Unity is subtracted from the vertical scales of
Fig. 1 and the horizontal scales are offset by the fitting
parameter a, whose physical relevance is discussed below.FIG. 2. Least-squares fit to the approach curve for (a) 20 nm
diameter dye-doped sphere; (b) nanorod; and (c) spherical
quantum dot. Fits to the power law of Eq. (1) (solid curves)
and an exponential function (dashed curves) are shown with the
data. The horizontal scales are offset by the fitted values of a,
and unity is subtracted from the vertical scales.
180801-2
FIG. 3 (color). Tip-enhanced fluorescence image of a nano-
rod. (a) Fluorescence demodulation signal. (b) AFM probe
height (5 nm at peak). (c) Total photon count. Insets in (a)
and (b) show signal profiles along the designated axis of length
250 nm. Blue curve in (d) shows the total photon count ( 0:2)
along the horizontal axis in (c), while red and black curves
show the photon count within two ranges of tip-sample sepa-
ration: 0< z< 0:4 nm (red) and 2:5< z < 4:5 nm (black).
Field-of-view is 400 200 nm: 256 lines of 1024 pixels each.
VOLUME 93, NUMBER 18 P H Y S I C A L R E V I E W L E T T E R S
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29 OCTOBER 2004The linear appearance of the data on the log-log scale
indicates a power-law decay, and the fluorescence en-
hancement () is fit to the function
  Fz
F1
 1  
2

a
z a

6
; (1)
where Fz=F1 is the detected fluorescence rate normal-
ized to the background rate (F1), and 
 is the field-
enhancement factor. The solid curves show least-squares
fits to Eq. (1) (
, a free parameters) while the dashed
curves are exponential decays. The data are clearly con-
sistent with a power law, and deviate systematically from
the best exponential fit. Previously, both power law [7,14]
and exponential [4] decays were fit to experimental data
with equal success. The precision of those experiments
was insufficient to differentiate between various models
because they did not probe the high-contrast region
within several nanometers of tip-sample contact.
The measured z a6 decay corresponds to the
‘‘near-field’’ term in the expression for the field intensity
near a point dipole, where z is the distance between the
apex of the tip and the sample surface. Thus in the limit of
an infinitesimally small target particle, the tip-enhanced
field is equivalent to a dipole field whose singularity is
located within the probe at a distance a from the apex,
where a is the tip radius-of-curvature. For finite-sized
target particles, the parameter a is a measure of the
degree of convolution between the intensity distribution
and the excitation-probability distribution, and as ex-
pected the fitted values of a increase for larger targets.
For smaller targets, a is converging to a value (10 nm)
that is characteristic of the silicon probes used here. This
is evidence that the field decay is indeed moderated only
by the sharpness of the tip.
Because this technique utilizes a large probe-
oscillation amplitude, the fluorescence rate is modulated
with maximum contrast, from the background level when
the tip is 30–40 nm above the sample to the peak en-
hancement at tip-sample contact (Fig. 1). The tip-
enhanced intensity profile has no ‘‘far-field’’ component
proportional to r2 (Fig. 2) and the corresponding fluo-
rescence profile arises from the ‘‘near-field’’ intensity
distribution only. Thus, the depth of fluorescence modu-
lation that results from oscillation of the probe is de-
coupled from the far-field background and the near-field
signal is easily extracted by subsequent demodulation.
A demodulated fluorescence image of a nanorod is
shown in Fig. 3(a). The image was generated by raster
scanning the AFM probe at a rate of 4 lines=s and then
dividing each line into spatiotemporal pixels. These scan
rates are at least 5 times faster than previous work for
one-photon fluorescence [7–9] and 10 times faster for
both two-photon fluorescence [6] and Raman scattering
[4]. Pixel values are computed offline as the component of
the photon-time-trace’s Fourier power spectrum at the180801-3probe-oscillation frequency
P 
X
i
sini

2 
X
i
cosi

2
; (2)
where i are the measured phase delays and the summa-
tion is over all detected photons for the given pixel. When
the probe is in the lateral vicinity of the target, the i are
biased toward the phase value of tip-sample contact
where the fluorescence rate is maximally enhanced.
Otherwise, the i are uniformly distributed and P van-
ishes to within the shot noise. Comparing Figs. 3(a) and
3(b) shows that the spatial resolution of the demodulated
image (see below) is comparable to the tip sharpness and
surpasses even the AFM resolution. Comparing Figs. 3(a)
and 3(c) demonstrates the effectiveness of the analysis
[Eq. (2)] in suppressing the fluorescence background.
Figure 3(d) shows three signal profiles along the hori-
zontal axis indicated in Fig. 3(c) corresponding to the
summation of photons over the entire probe-oscillation-
cycle (blue), and within a tip-sample separation range of
0< z< 0:4 nm (red), and 2:5< z< 4:5 nm (black). Here,
horizontal profiles are chosen to avoid the regions of
quantum-dot blinking [dark stripes in Fig. 3(c)]. As in-
dicated on the figure, the data corresponding to the blue
profile have been divided by a factor of 5. Nearly 20% of
the detected photons are emitted when the tip apex is
within 0:4 nm of the sample surface (red curve) even
though this corresponds to only 3% of the oscillation
period. The black curve approximates the typical scan-
ning conditions of previous ANSOM experiments which
maintained a tip-sample gap roughly in this range [7–9].
Clearly, those conditions yield both inferior contrast and
resolution compared to our technique.
The approach curve measurements (Figs. 1 and 2)
suggest a straightforward approach for estimating the180801-3
FIG. 4 (color). Tip-enhanced fluorescence image of quantum
dots. The degree of contrast is emphasized by false-color relief.
The image contains 512 lines of 1000 pixels each. The arrows
indicate the measured FWHM for two quantum dots.
VOLUME 93, NUMBER 18 P H Y S I C A L R E V I E W L E T T E R S
week ending
29 OCTOBER 2004spatial resolution. The tip-enhanced field is modeled by a
point dipole using a conservative estimate for tip-
curvature (a  14 nm) as suggested by the quantum-dot
approach curve in Fig. 2(c). A Monte Carlo simulation is
then used to generate ‘‘mock’’ data from two hypothetical
point sources separated by some distance and the analysis
algorithm [Eq. (2)] is applied. The minimum resolvable
separation between the point sources is then determined
by applying the Sparrow criterion to the demodulated
image, i.e., where the central dip between the two sources
vanishes [24]. Use of the Sparrow rather than the
Rayleigh criterion assures that the estimated resolution
is independent of the particular moment calculated in
Eq. (2). The simulations suggest a spatial resolution of
11–12 nm for the nanorod images shown in Fig. 3.
Figure 4 shows a fluorescence demodulation image of
spherical quantum dots in false-color relief. The arrows
indicate the measured FWHM for two dots, and the
model suggests a spatial resolution of 8 nm for the
smaller one.
In conclusion, we made the first definitive measurement
of the tip-enhanced optical field at the apex of a sharp
probe and rigorously confirmed a dipolelike model. The
technique developed for these measurements overcomes
several major obstacles in ANSOM performance and led
to the first one-photon fluorescence images with resolu-
tion below 10 nm. In contrast to previous work, the tip-
enhanced excitation rate is maximized because the probe
apex intermittently contacts the sample and thus the
enhanced field is probed at atomic-scale distances from
the apex. The intermittent tip-sample contact also induces
modulation of the excitation rate; demodulating the re-
sultant signal strongly suppresses the problematic far-field
background and enables spatial resolution limited only by180801-4tip sharpness. The improvements in background suppres-
sion and spatial resolution will be even more acute for
multiphoton processes (surface-enhanced Raman scatter-
ing; coherent anti-Stokes Raman scattering; two-photon
fluorescence) compared to one-photon fluorescence, be-
cause the induced signal is then more strongly confined at
the tip apex. In the future, it may be possible to image
samples in a wet environment to measure dynamic pro-
cesses in molecular-scale structural biology. Finally, it
may also be possible to use carbon single-wall nanotubes
attached to AFM probes [25,26] to further improve spa-
tial resolution.
We thank Delia Milliron, Ben Boussert, and Paul
Alivisatos for the nanocrystals and acknowledge the fi-
nancial support of Bruce Burrows and Pharmagenomix
Inc. J. M. G. was partially supported by the Beckman
Institute.*Permanent address: University of UT, Department of
Physics, 115 South 1400 East, Salt Lake City, UT 84112.
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Tip-Enhanced Fluorescence Microscopy at 10 Nanometer Resolution

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