5 MHz, 2 N/m piezoresistive cantilevers with INCISIVE tips

Piezoresistive atomic-force-microscope (AFM) cantilevers with sensitivities of (AR/R)//spl Aring/=1.1/spl times/10/sup -/5, displacement resolutions of 2/spl times/10/sup -/3 /spl Aring///spl radic/Hz, mechanical response times of less than 90 ns, and stiffnesses of 2 N/m have been fabricated from a silicon-on-insulator (SOI) wafer using a novel frontside-only release process. To reduce mass, the cantilevers utilize novel INCISIVE (IN-plane, Crystallographically-defined-SIlicon, VariablE aspect-ratio) tips with radius of curvature of 40 /spl Aring/. The cantilevers have been used in an experimental AFM data storage system to read back data with an areal density of 10 Gb/cm/sup 2/. Some cantilever designs have sufficient displacement resolution to detect their own thermal vibration in air. The INCISIVE tips also have applications to other types of sensors.