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⇱ Atomic force microscopy from nanoscale imaging to holistic exploration | Nature Reviews Physics


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Forty years after its invention, atomic force microscopy has evolved from a simple surface imaging tool into one of the most versatile measurement platforms in nanoscience. This Comment traces the key innovations.

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Fig. 1: The first atomic force microscope.
The alternative text for this image may have been generated using AI.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Louvain Institute of Biomolecular Science and Technology, Université catholique de Louvain, Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium

    David Alsteens

  2. Swiss Nanoscience Institute (SNI), Department of Physics, University of Basel, Basel, Switzerland

    Ernst Meyer & Christoph Gerber

  3. Department of Biosystems Science and Engineering, ETH Zurich, Basel, Switzerland

    Daniel J. Müller

Authors
  1. David Alsteens
  2. Ernst Meyer
  3. Daniel J. Müller
  4. Christoph Gerber

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Daniel J. Müller.

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Competing interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

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Alsteens, D., Meyer, E., Müller, D.J. et al. Atomic force microscopy from nanoscale imaging to holistic exploration. Nat Rev Phys (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s42254-026-00956-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s42254-026-00956-3

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