Design of magnetic resonance force microscopy probe based on a commercially available charge coupled device camera

The technique of magnetic resonance force microscopy (MRFM) is proposed with the purpose to enhance the sensitivity of the inductively detected conventional magnetic resonance technique. The IBM MRFM group demonstrated magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to the nanoscale level by using MRFM. The spatial resolution of the inductive method is on the order of a few micrometers. In this paper, we introduce an MRFM probe equipped with a charge coupled device (CCD) camera. We show that this CCD camera is very helpful to correct the optical fiber-to-cantilever and magnet-to-sample alignments which can be the determinant of success or failure in an MRFM experiment. Also, this camera enables us to monitor an experimental setup inside a vacuum chamber of P = 10(-5) mbar in real-time. Then, we verified the usefulness of the CCD camera through an electron spin resonance experiment on a diphenylpicrylhydrazyl (DPPH) sample. We also discuss the extensibility of the CCD camera for low temperature experiments, creating an atmosphere in which MRFM can flourish truly to its full potential in the field of nanotechnology.