A novel probe–sample separation estimation scheme for atomic force microscopy

This paper presents a novel estimation scheme to calculate the probe–sample separation in atomic force microscopy (AFM). The AFM is capable of measuring the sample topography by using a probe to interact with the sample. The interaction is dominated by the atomic force which is dependent on the probe–sample separation and sample properties. The key to successful AFM applications is accurate sensing and regulation of the probe–sample separation in nanometer scale. Our proposed scheme provides an accurate estimate of the probe–sample separation based on the information of the main sinusoidal and its harmonics. The estimation is shown to have a good performance even when noise is present.