Abstract
Electrostatic force microscopy (EFM) is often used for nanoscale dielectric spectroscopy, the measurement of local dielectric properties of materials as a function of frequency. However, the frequency range of atomic force microscopy (AFM)-based dielectric spectroscopy has been limited to a few kilohertz by the resonance frequency and noise of soft microcantilevers used for this purpose. Here, we boost the frequency range of local dielectric spectroscopy by 3 orders of magnitude from a few kilohertz to a few megahertz by developing a technique that exploits the high resonance frequency and low thermal noise of ultrasmall cantilevers (USCs). We map the frequency response of the real and imaginary components of the capacitance gradient (∂C(ω)/∂z) by using second-harmonic EFM and a theoretical model, which relates cantilever dynamics to the complex dielectric constant. We demonstrate the method by mapping the nanoscale dielectric spectrum of polymer-based materials for organic electronic devices. Beyond offering a powerful extension to AFM-based dielectric spectroscopy, the approach also allows the identification of electrostatic excitation frequencies which affords high dielectric contrast on nanomaterials.
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