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Immaterial tip concept by light confinement
Author(s) -
Grosjean T.,
Courjon D.
Publication year - 2001
Publication title -
journal of microscopy
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.569
H-Index - 111
eISSN - 1365-2818
pISSN - 0022-2720
DOI - 10.1046/j.1365-2818.2001.00881.x
Subject(s) - evanescent wave , optics , electric field , square (algebra) , physics , materials science , molecular physics , geometry , mathematics , quantum mechanics
It is shown that the combination of TM polarized coherent evanescent light beams can lead to ( x , y ) confined light distributions. Moreover, owing to the evanescent nature of the interfering beams, the spatial distribution of the square modulus of the electric field does not vary versus the z ‐distance. Such an energy distribution can be used as a virtual tip, allowing the scanning of a sample without any mechanical contact with it.