Flexural vibrations of double tapered atomic force microscope cantilevers studied by considering the contact position and using the differential quadrature method

Abstract

The resonant frequency of flexural vibrations for a double tapered atomic force microscope (AFM) cantilever has been investigated by using the Timoshenko beam theory. In this paper, the effects of various parameters on the dimensionless frequency of vibrations of the AFM cantilever have been studied. The differential quadrature method (DQM) is employed to solve the nonlinear differential equations of motion. The results show that the resonant frequency decreases when the Timoshenko beam parameter or the cantilever thickness increases, and high-order modes are more sensitive to it. The first frequency is sensitive only in the lower range of contact stiffness, but the higher-order modes are sensitive to the contact stiffness in a larger range. Increasing the tip height increases the sensitivity of the vibrational modes in a limited range of normal contact stiffness. Furthermore, with increasing the breadth taper ratio, the frequency increases. The DQM results are compared with the exact solution for a rectangular AFM cantilever.