Near-field infrared nanoscopy of bilayered, nanostructured, and anisotropic media
Phys. Rev. B 111, 245427 – Published 20 June, 2025
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/214w-j3yc
Abstract
Characterizing materials and devices at the nanoscale demands the innovation of new techniques for measurement and analysis. Scattering-type scanning near-field infrared microscopy (S-SNIM) has proven to be an indispensable nano-optical probe of quantum materials. It has been most effective in measuring local phononic and electronic phenomena at infrared frequencies with nanometer-scale spatial resolution. However, realizing the full potential of experimental access to the nanoscale via S-SNIM requires an intricate understanding of the complex light-probe-sample interaction. In this work, through numerical modeling, we drastically expand our knowledge of the complex light-probe-sample interaction in S-SNIM to analyze and describe experimental measurements on anisotropic, bilayered, and nanostructured systems. This work is focused toward a universal S-SNIM analysis method based on numerical modeling.
