Touria Cohen-Bouhacina

Hydrodynamics of oscillating atomic force microscopy cantilevers in viscous fluids

We present a study of thermal noise of commercially available atomic force microscopy (AFM) cantilevers in air and in water. The purpose of this work is to investigate the oscillation behavior of a clamped AFM microlever in liquids. Up to eight vibration modes are recorded. The experimental results are compared to theoretical predictions from the hydrodynamic functions corresponding to rigid transverse oscillations of an infinitely long rectangular beam. Except for the low-frequency modes, the known hydrodynamic functions cannot describe the amount of dissipated energy due to the liquid motion induced by the cantilever oscillation. The observed variation of the damping coefficient is smaller than the one predicted. The difference at higher modes between the mentioned theoretical description and experimental results is discussed with the help of numerical solutions of the three-dimensional Navier–Stokes equation.

Characterization of dynamic cellular adhesion of osteoblasts using atomic force microscopy

Atomic force microscopy (AFM) can be used to visualize the cell morphology in an aqueous environment and in real time. It also allows the investigation of mechanical properties such as cell compliance as a function of cell attachment. This study characterized and evaluated osteoblast adhesion by AFM.

Measurement of the slip length of water flow on graphite surface

We present measurements of the hydrodynamic damping of an atomic force microscopy cantilever-tip immersed in water and approaching a mica surface or a graphite surface. Water completely wets the mica surface while it partially wets the graphite surface with a contact angle of 74°. The measurements show that the damping is higher on mica than on graphite giving a slip length of about 8nm on this latter surface.

Improved acoustic excitation of atomic force microscope cantilevers in liquids

A simple modification of the existing setup used in the commercial atomic force microscopes (AFM) is presented with the aim of improving the piezoacoustic excitation in liquid used by the AFM community. The improvement removes the spurious peaks not corresponding to the resonance frequencies of the cantilever oscillation. To illustrate the benefits of such a clean excitation, very fine effects like the structuring of mesitylene confined between the oscillating AFM tip and a highly oriented pyrolitic graphite surface could be measured with subangstrom oscillation amplitudes and with very high accuracy.

Dissipation induced by attractive interaction in dynamic force microscopy : contribution of adsorbed water layers.

At room temperature and under ambient conditions, due to the adsorption, a water film is always present on silica surfaces. If the surface is investigated with a scanning probe method in contact mode, this causes the formation of a meniscus between the tip and the surface. This liquid neck generates additional capillary forces between the nano-tip and the surface. In dynamic mode, due to the action of the oscillating tip on the surface, the mechanical response of the adsorbed water layers can induce additional dissipation that is probed through the phase variations of the oscillator. In the present work, we analyze by dynamic force microscopy the growth of a water film on a silica surface as a function of time. The silica sample is first cleaned and heated at 420 °C, then is exposed to dry conditions. The influence of the water film is checked with the dynamic mode by using intermittent contact and noncontact situations. To describe the experimental observations, additional dissipation is taken into account when the tip approaches the surface. The results of the fits allow the evaluation of the dissipation induced by the attractive interaction between the tip and the silica surface related to the adsorption of water molecules on surface as a function of time. Results are compared to previous tribological studies performed in contact mode and infrared spectroscopy measurements on the silica for which the key parameter was the surface temperature instead of time. The two experimental results are in good agreement.

Reduction of the cantilever hydrodynamic damping near a surface by ion-beam milling

In this work, we evaluate the influence of the cantilever width on the hydrodynamic drag force. To do so, we present an experimental analysis of the thermal motion in air and liquid of a commercial and modified by focused ion-beam (FIB) milling silicon nitride cantilevers. From the thermal noise spectrum, we extract the damping for different cantilever-sample distances. We show that the hydrodynamic force due to the drag can be reduced by almost an order of magnitude when reducing the cantilever width. With the FIB modification (milling) one can still use conventional atomic force microscope heads with a significant reduction of the hydrodynamic forces.

Analytical description of the motion of an acoustic-driven atomic force microscope cantilever in liquid

In this letter the authors present an analytical description that enables determining the motion of an acoustic-driven atomic force microscope cantilever in liquid. The authors show that for low quality factors the effective driving force that acts on the deflection motion depends on the damping. The authors derived equations that accurately give the amplitude and phase of the cantilever deflection and the authors also give the expressions of the damping and stiffness of the interaction.

High sensitive mesoporous TiO2-coated Love wave device for heavy metal detection

This work deals with the design of a highly sensitive whole cell-based biosensor for heavy metal detection in liquid medium. The biosensor is constituted of a Love wave sensor coated with a polyelectrolyte multilayer (PEM). Escherichia coli bacteria are used as bioreceptors as their viscoelastic properties are influenced by toxic heavy metals. The acoustic sensor is constituted of a quartz substrate with interdigitated transducers and a SiO2 guiding layer. However, SiO2 shows some degradation when used in a saline medium. Mesoporous TiO2 presents good mechanical and chemical stability and offers a high active surface area. Then, the addition of a thin titania layer dip-coated onto the acoustic path of the sensor is proposed to overcome the silica degradation and to improve the mass effect sensitivity of the acoustic device. PEM and bacteria deposition, and heavy metal influence, are real time monitored through the resonance frequency variations of the acoustic device. The first polyelectrolyte layer is inserted through the titania mesoporosity, favouring rigid link of the PEM on the sensor and improving the device sensitivity. Also, the mesoporosity of surface increases the specific surface area which can be occupied and favors the formation of homogeneous PEM. It was found a frequency shift near -20±1 kHz for bacteria immobilization with titania film instead of -7±3 kHz with bare silica surface. The sensitivity is highlighted towards cadmium detection. Moreover, in this paper, particular attention is given to the immobilization of bacteria and to biosensor lifetime. Atomic Force Microscopy characterizations of the biosurface have been done for several weeks. They showed significant morphological differences depending on the bacterial life time. We noticed that the lifetime of the biosensor is longer in the case of using a mesoporous TiO2 layer.

Probing the threshold of membrane damage and cytotoxicity effects induced by silica nanoparticles in Escherichia coli bacteria

The engineering of nanomaterials, because of their specific properties, is increasingly being developed for commercial purposes over the past decades, to enhance diagnosis, cosmetics properties as well as sensing efficiency. However, the understanding of their fate and thus their interactions at the cellular level with bio-organisms remains elusive. Here, we investigate the size- and charge-dependence of the damages induced by silica nanoparticles (SiO2-NPs) on Gram-negative Escherichia coli bacteria. We show and quantify the existence of a NPs size threshold discriminating toxic and inert SiO2-NPs with a critical particle diameter (Φc) in the range 50nm-80nm. This particular threshold is identified at both the micrometer scale via viability tests through Colony Forming Units (CFU) counting, and the nanometer scale via atomic force microscopy (AFM). At this nanometer scale, AFM emphasizes the interaction between the cell membrane and SiO2-NPs from both topographic and mechanical points of view. For SiO2-NPs with Φ>Φc no change in E. coli morphology nor its outer membrane (OM) organization is observed unless the NPs are positively charged in which case reorganization and disruption of the OM are detected. Conversely, when Φ

Influence of oxidized lipids on palmitoyl-oleoyl-phosphatidylcholine organization, contribution of Langmuir monolayers and Langmuir–Blodgett films

In this work, we studied the interaction of two oxidized lipids, PoxnoPC and PazePC, with POPC phospholipid. Mean molecular areas obtained from (π-A) isotherms of mixed PoxnoPC-POPC and PazePC-POPC monolayers revealed different behaviors of these two oxidized lipids: the presence of PoxnoPC in the monolayers induces their expansion, mean molecular areas being higher than those expected in the case of ideal mixtures. PazePC-POPC behave on the whole ideally. This difference can be explained by a different conformation of oxidized lipids. Moreover the carboxylic function of PazePC is protonated under our experimental conditions, as shown by (π-A) isotherms of PazePC at different pH values. Both oxidized lipids induce also an increase of the monolayer elasticity, PoxnoPC being slightly more efficient than PazePC. These monolayers were transferred from the air-water interface onto mica supports for a study by AFM. AFM images are on the whole homogenous, suggesting the presence of only one lipid phase in both cases. However, in the case of PazePC-POPC monolayers, AFM images show also the presence of areas thicker of 7nm to 10nm than the surrounding lipid phase, probably due to the local formation of multilayer systems induced by compression.