FEMTO-ST has published a paper describing a heterodyne interferometric scanning near-field optical microscope developed for characterizing, at the nanometric scale, refractive index variations in thin films. An optical lateral resolution of 80 nm (λ/19) and a precision smaller than 10⁻⁴ on the refractive index difference have been achieved. Samples made of thin nanocrystalline layer of lithium niobate were jointly prepared by project partners ABCD and EPFL.
The new SNOM appears as being a key tool for characterizing new kinds of thin films developed for nanophotonics applications.
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FEMTO-ST is a CNRS laboratory (UMR 6174) under trusteeship of the CNRS, University of Franche-Comté Ecole Nationale Supérieure de Mécanique et de Microtechniques, and Technology University of Belfort-Montbéliard.