Current-modulating magnetic force microscope probe

A new current-modulating probe for the magnetic force microscope (MFM) is proposed in this article. The magnetic field, which will be used to interact with a magnetic specimen's stray field, is induced on the sharp tip of the conical magnetic core surrounded by a microfabricated single turn conductive coil. The reciprocity principle is used to obtain the force acting on the probe due to the specimen's stray field when scanned over a magnetic specimen. The magnetic field intensity is adjustable by control of the applied current. Images of specimens have been modeled using this probe. The suitability to different specimens is seen to be the biggest advantage of this scheme over the conventional probe designs. (C) 2001 American Institute of Physics.