Imaging with molecular contrast at the nanoscale is important for a myriad of applications, yet it remains a technical challenge. Over the past two decades, various flavors of optical spectroscopy combined with atomic force microscopy have been developed, each offering hope for a more routine nanospectroscopy technology. One of these approaches is photo-induced force microscopy (PiFM), a non-contact scan probe technique that is sensitive to the light-induced polarization in the material. PiFM has been used to generate molecular maps with 5 nm resolution, based on absorption contrast or on contrast derived from nonlinear optical interactions. Nonetheless, questions remain about the origin of the signal, in particular the possible contribution of forces that result from the thermal expansion of the sample. In this presentation, we will discuss various physical mechanisms that contribute to the PiFM signal and highlight several applications that are unique to the PiFM technique.

Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy is an established technique for characterization and recognition of inorganic, organic and biological materials by their far-field absorption spectra in the infrared fingerprint region. However, due to the diffraction limit conventional FTIR spectroscopy is unsuitable for measurements with nanoscale spatial resolution. Scattering-type Scanning Near-field Optical Microscopy (s-SNOM) allows to overcome the diffraction limit of conventional light microscopy or spectroscopy enabling optical measurements at a spatial resolution of 10nm, not only at IR frequencies but also in the whole spectral range from visible to terahertz. s-SNOM employs an externally-illuminated sharp metallic AFM tip to create a nanoscale hot-spot at its apex. The optical tip-sample near-field interaction is determined by the local dielectric properties (refractive index) of the sample and detection of the elastically tip-scattered light yields nanoscale resolved near-field images simultaneous to topography.Use of material-selective frequencies in the mid-IR spectral range can be exploited to fully characterize polymer blends or phase change polymers with nanometer-scale domains. Quantification of free-carrier concentration and carrier mobility in doped semiconductor nanowires, analysis of 2D (graphene) nanostructures, or study phase propagation mechanisms in energy storage materials is achieved by amplitude- and phase-resolved near-field imaging. Furthermore, here we introduce correlative tip-enhanced nanoscopy, enables complete collocal vibrational analysis of both IR- and Raman-active modes at the same spatial scale. Our instrument allows for a straight-forward implementation of nano-PL measurements using background suppressing provided by the demodulation of detector signal utilized in nano-FTIR detection scheme. Combining Raman, TERS, nano-FTIR and nano-PL measurements in the same instrument significantly reduces the effort of correlating the resulting datasets, enabling complete optical analysis at nanoscale, which has not been possible so far.

Chemical identification on the nanoscale is a long sought after capability from the inception of AFM. AFM-IR has proven to be uniquely successful in achieving this among all other attempts. It uses a mid-IR laser that is focused onto the AFM tip. Light absorption by the sample results in photothermal expansion that causes a detectable cantilever deflection change of the AFM probe. The obtained IR spectra correlate with conventional FTIR spectroscopy but are associated with sub-10nm spatial resolution.

However, a single data set rarely tells the full story and multiplexed analysis is essential to fully understand a material. We use an AFM-IR microscope with image registration and overlay capability to return to the same position on a sample when changing AFM probes, enabling extensive multimodal analysis. Data on a two-component polymer sample PS-LDPE comprising polystyrene and polyethylene reveals nanoIR spectra that correlate well with FTIR, while nanoIR maps at different IR wavenumbers provide the spatial distribution of each component. Further, we show that they are directly correlated at the nanometer level through PeakForce QNM elastic modulus and adhesion maps, as well as work function (surface potential) and dielectric maps with FM-KPFM (frequency-modulated Kelvin probe force microscopy). Many of the properties can be conveniently obtained simultaneously, while others are preferably obtained sequentially in a colocalized manner with the optimal probe choice and parameter settings for each AFM mode. Data on real-world industrial samples is then discussed, e.g. SBR (styrene-butadiene rubber) with carbon-black additives for car tires, exemplifying how ratio-map and multimodal property mapping unravel information not seen through one technique alone. In another use case chemical identification is complemented by nDMA, a mode where viscoelastic nanoscale sample properties are measured that match bulk dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA) data.