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Kleindiek Micromanipulator protocol
Supply:
Micromanipulator probes: model no. T-4-10-1mm (www.picoprobe.com)
Pliers, wire cutter, and gloves
Micromanipulator protocol:
- Cut the Picoprobe needle (in box) slightly above the tape, holding the upper part with pliers so that the length is approx. 1.5 cm
- Orient the tungsten needle tip at the bottom and bend the holding wire slightly toward the bottom at about 5-7mm from the holder tip.
- Vent chamber, detach the micromanipulator tip holder (careful!! do not touch side or top or wires of the micromanipulator unit, only touch the tip near the end) Micromanipulator unit contains sensitive mechanical actuators!
- Insert the bent picoprobe needle into the micromanipulator tip
- Insert micromanipulator tip into the micromanipulator arm.
- Insert your sample into sample holder on stage: With stage control, center the sample holder by clicking the middle of the holder map circle. Set the height of your sample (highest point) already at about 5 mm using the “5 mm mark of the elephant nose.
- Now position the tip of the micromanipulator arm to the center of the sample and set the height between 5mm to 1mm using the elephant nose (between 5mm and 1 mm mark on tool).
- Turn on the micromanipulator controller. Push ‘analog‘ button to activate PS2 controller and move the micromanipulator arm far away from the sample holder to the rest position do not change the z-height anymore!!!!
- Arm movements: LEFT ANALOG ( see fig.2 ) : ‘ UP '- arm moves away from sample to door (out), ‘ DOWN ' –arm moves closer to sample (in), additionally ‘left' – retract arm closer, ‘right' – extends arm.
- ‘ select' and ‘ start ' buttons are for sensitivity movement (finer and coarse)
- . Arm movements: RIGHT ANALOG : ‘ UP ' – moves needle up (increases distance between sample and picoprobe, ‘ DOWN ' – decreases distance between sample and picoprobe). Please do “up-down” movements only with speed levels 1-3!!!! (careful do not pump into column!!!!
- 6 levels of speeds: switch with arrows on left side of kleindiek: 4-6 is done with motors (6 is fastest), 1-3 is done with piezo, 1 slowliest. Please practice before closing the chamber – re-position after practice.
- After positioning picoprobe above sample (step 7), vacuum the chamber, wake up the system, focus (5000x), correct stigmatism, LINK Z , set Z height to 5mm, center to the feature you want to move.
- Establish EUCENTRIC HEIGHT (very important!!)– tilt up to 52 degree.
- Put the stage tilt back to 0 degree.
- At lowest SEM magnification, move the micromanipulator arm to the center of stage (i.e., ‘left analog' move to ‘down' position) until you see the image of the tip in the SEM screen. And position the very tip on the center of crosshair.
- Snapshot or turn on the ion beam so that the feature and tip is visible.
- Tilt the stage in small steps (e.g. to 10, 20 , 30 …..52) and at the SAME TIME lower the micromanipulator tip (Z height, ‘right analog' to down – slow speed) SLOWLY – WATCH the ELECTRON image for Z height.
- At 52 degree, the electron image show Z distance of the tip to the sample surface and ion beam image shows x and y position of the tip.
- NOW carefully move the tip (x, y and z) to the feature you want to move until the tip close/touch the feature.
- Deposit platinum at 200-500 nm thickness – use appropriate current.(30pA x area)
- Verify on both ion and electron images that the Pt has been deposited.
- Increase Z distance to a certain value and move the stage to the area you want to put the picked feature. (NOTE: when the sample holder is moving in x and y direction, the micromanipulator arm tip will stay, however, during stage tilting, the micromanipulator arm tip will move together with the sample holder.
- Make sure to increase the distance of tip a little from sample BEFORE tilt back to 0.
- When done, move the stage tilt back to 0 degree and position the MM arm AWAY from the center – back to initial rest area.
Figure1: Image of sample-needle height
Figure 2: Micromanipulator moves