Renishaw plc-Spectroscopy Products Div.

This instrument, a collaborative effort between Renishaw plc of Wotton-under-Edge, UK, and Nanonics Imaging Ltd. of Jerusalem, combines the chemical sensitivity of Raman spectroscopy with the ultrahigh spatial resolution of scanning probe, atomic force and near-field optical microscopy.

The companies devised this microscope to meet the demands that have arisen as the developments in nanotechnology have grown and the need to probe smaller samples has increased. The NSOM/AFM-100 Confocal/RM series Raman microscope improves the resolution of conventional optical microscopes by five times, to 100 nm, and has the potential to extend Raman spectroscopy to below 50 nm.

The system operates in two modes. AFM/Raman enables users to view surface topography and structures to monitor changes that are not visible with conventional light microscopy, while simultaneous Raman data provide chemically specific molecular and structural information. NSOM/Raman mode breaks the diffraction-limited spatial resolution for Raman spectroscopy coupled to a conventional microscope to offer users ultrahigh-resolution data for scanning probe and Raman techniques.

Previously, using both methodologies meant transfer of the sample between instruments, and locating the exact region analyzed by the Raman microscope when imaging with the selected scanning probe microscopy (SPM) technique was virtually impossible. Now simultaneous Raman spectroscopy and SPM can be done on the same instrument.