Local fluorescent probes for the fluorescence resonance energy transfer scanning near-field optical microscopy

We present fluorescence resonance energy transfer (FRET) images of donor dye molecule clusters recorded using a local fluorescence probe for scanning near-field optical microscopy (SNOM): standard apertured SNOM fiber tip coated with the 30–100-nm-thick polymer layer stained with the acceptor dye molecules. The tip works as a “self-sharpening pencil”: the apical layers of the FRET-active tip coating are mechanically worn out during scanning thus continuously exposing a fresh active apex to continue imaging. Only a few tens of acceptor molecules are used to form the optical images, and using such an approach spatial resolution better than the size of the aperture is achievable.