Experimental study of stochastic resonance in atomic force microscopes

Stochastic resonance is an interesting phenomenon which can occur in bistable systems subject to periodic and random forcing. This effect produces an improvement in the sensitivity of the bistable system to the periodic signal. In this paper, stochastic resonance for atomic force microscope (AFM) is studied. The experimental results indicate that the AFM can be modeled as a bistable system similar to the Schmitt trigger, for which stochastic resonance has been well studied. The results indicate that stochastic resonance in AFM can be applied in many technological contexts as, for example, in the analysis of the effects of thermal noise in order to optimize the achievable resolution for imaging.