Quantitative measurements of indentation moduli by atomic force acoustic microscopy using a dual reference method

Atomic force acoustic microscopy (AFAM) was used to quantitatively determine material indentation moduli by measuring local mechanical responses. A dual reference method has been shown to be capable of extracting the modulus of a material within 3% of the calculated expected value without any assumptions of the probe’s mechanical properties. The use of this developed method also allows for the calculation of the maximum precision in the quantitative determination of the indentation modulus of materials using AFAM. A parallel analysis of the single and dual reference AFAM techniques isolates the inaccuracy induced by the assumption that the indentation modulus of the atomic force microscopy probe used is the same as bulk silicon.