DEVELOPMENT OF A NEAR-FIELD OPTICAL-SYSTEM FOR INVESTIGATING THIN ORGANIC FILMS

We describe the development of combining a commercially available scan ning near-field optical microscope (SNOM) with a high-optical-throughp ut spectrometer and a CCD camera for the purpose of investigating the optical properties of thin organic films at the nanometer-scale. The c ombined system is capable of obtaining either SNOM images or pixel-by- pixel near-field spectroscopy in either transmission or reflection mod e. As an initial test sample, we used a thin film of poly(phenylene vi nylene) and tris(8-hydroxy) quinoline aluminium to obtain. both near-f ield optical transmission and fluorescence images as well as fluoresce nce spectra.