In this work, tip sliding at the water/substrate interfacial region was used to investigate the pattern observed during image acquisition with atomic resolution in atomic force microscopy. The process responsible for the pattern formation is the oscillatory movement of the tip in the direction that is normal to scanning induced by a change in the water interfacial dielectric permittivity from epsilon approximate to 4 at the interface to epsilon approximate to 80 (bulk value) that results in a variation of the measured force acting on the tip of approximate to 30 pN. (c) 2006 American Institute of Physics.892
