Imaging of a soft, weakly adsorbing, living cell with a colloid probe tapping atomic force microscope technique

Here, we propose a new method to improve the atomic force microscopy (AFM) image resolution of soft samples, such as cells, in liquid. Attaching a colloid probe to a cantilever was seen improve the image resolution of a living cell in a physiological buffer solution, obtained by the normal tapping mode, when compared to an image obtained using a regular cantilever tip. This may be due to the averaging out of the cantilever tip swinging caused by the visco-elasticity of the cell. The resolution was best, when silica spheres with a 3.3 microm diameter were attached. Although larger spheres gave a resolution better than a bare cantilever tip, their resolution was less than that obtained for the 3.3 microm diameter silica colloid. This dependency of the image resolution on the colloid probe size may be a result of the increased macroscopic van der Waals attraction between the cell and probe, the decreased repulsive force dependence on the cantilever probe radius, and the decrease in resolution due to the increased probe size. The size of the colloid probe, which should be attached to the cantilever to give the best image resolution, would be the one that optimises the combined result of these facts.