Fig. 1: Design and fabrication of shear-mode AFM probes based on cellular CMA tips.

a The geometrical design of the CMA body. The mechanical behavior can be tuned by adjusting the unit side length (indicated by the scalar variable “a” in the figure and context). b Schematic of the CMA structure-based AFM tip. c Photographic image of the assembled AFM probe and the microscopic view of its components, which includes a commercial tip mount with a vertical tuning fork, a single-mode fiber, and a cellular CMA structure direct laser written on top of the fiber facet, as shown in the insets. d, e Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) images of the CMA structures (a = 5 μm, 15 stacking layers of cellular units). f SEM image of the tip apex with ~47 nm radius. Scale bars are 2 mm, 10 μm, 2 μm, 500 nm for (c–f), respectively.