November+1-2

November 1st:

Today I scanned on the portable AFM, which was back in the lab for the first time in several weeks. I scanned a clean piece of gold, annealed by Annette, paying special attention to any crashing or disturbances. A strange feature today was the presence of very well-defined, straight, and regular lines for the first several images. Becky thought it was likely noise, and after I adjusted the P- and I-gains, the lines went away. (Images to come)

110110AA-AH

November 2nd:

I scanned the same piece of gold on the portable AFM. The lines did not come back at all today. One strange thing that I did notice however, was the flatness of the surface. Becky attributed this to Annette's proficiency in annealing, which makes sense, as an well annealed piece does not have as many extreme features. The z-range was sometimes less than 1 micron, unlike the usual approx. 1-4 micron z-range. At one point i went to the lowest possible z-range, .072 microns, but that became almost blurry, so I increased the range and adjusted the P- and I-gains.

110210AA-AG