Vanadium oxide thermal microprobes for nanocalorimetry

Highly sensitive thermal microprobes are presented, consisting of curved cantilevers with vanadium oxide thermistors located at their tips. The cantilevers are realized by stress-engineered metal thin films and the thermistors consist of reactively sputter-deposited vanadium pentoxide. The thermistors are electrically contacted through the stressed metal layer, and at the same time thermally insulated from the substrate due to the relatively small thickness and large length of the cantilevers. We propose to apply these novel thermal microprobes in a nanocalorimetry system, in order to lower the cost and increase the sensitivity of the measurements.