Getting access
The access to the AFM infrastructure is granted primarily in conjunction with beamtime at MAX IV Laboratory. It is important that the users mention the AFM (or other Support Microscopy labs research infrastructure) in DUO when submitting their proposals. The next proposal call opens 2023-09-05, will close on 2023-09-26 and covers beamtimes for the period Februari – August 2023 (See: https://www.maxiv.lu.se/users/proposal-calls/)
Most of the beamlines at MAX IV Laboratory are oversubscribed, so proposals should be compelling and carefully written in order to be chosen by the advisory committee. If access to the scanning tunneling microscope or vacuum suitcase is desired, and, in particular, the help of an operator is intended, the users must include a brief description of a planned microscopy experiment. Users are always welcome to send the “STM-part” of the proposal to the STM staff if feedback is wanted.
We stick to a standard beamtime allocation at 1.5 GeV ring, where beamtime begins 0900 Wednesday and ends 0900 the following Monday. When writing proposals, request and plan the following 4 hours/shift, 6 shifts/day, 5 days.
As of Spring’23 run the research infrastructure of Microscopy labs at MAX IV is available via self-service booking system. See the guide on how to book the equipment here.
Please, note, that the machine is placed in Optics Metrology Lab. The lab is a clean, restricted environment where general user admittance is only permitted after clean room training. Please, contact Louisa Pickworth regarding your lab access. This also means that you need to schedule your experiment with the operator(s) well in advance.
Remote access and operator’s help
As of today there is no remote access to the AFM instrument that can be granted to general users.
The users with experience in AFM may be granted the permission to run the instrument themselves after an introduction. Users who would require operator’s help in order to run their AFM experiments must get in touch with lab manager well in advance to discuss and agree upon the workflow.
Data policy
The AFM control PC is not connected to any network, and due to the security reasons it is not possible to bring in and insert user’s own memory sticks for the data transfer. Once your experiment is finished, your data shall be put in the cloud storage of Lunds University (as of today provided by Box) and yo ushall receive a link for copying the data. Please, note that the data shall be stored and available for download for a limited time, typically 6 months. Therefore, it is important that you download and archive your data.
The instrument
The microscope is Veeco/Digital Instruments (now Bruker) Dimension 3100.
It clears a field of view of max 90×90 micrometers with max 5 micrometer total height difference. The lateral resolution for 90 micrometer FOV is better than 50 nm, for 10 micrometer scan – better than 2 nm.
The sample size must be below 20 cm (8″) diameter and 2 cm height.
We provide cantilevers for user experiments, however, users are welcome to bring their own cantilevers for tapping or contact modes.