Feedback In SPM Instrumentation

Mechanical profilers create a topographic representation of a surface by recording the motion of a sharpened probe as it traverses a surface. In a mechanical profiler, as first conceived in the early 20th century, the force of the probe on a surface varies as the probe is scanned across the surface. A dramatic improvement was made in profiler instrumentation with the addition of a feedback loop that maintained a fixed relationship between the probe and surface during a scan.