INVESTIGATION OF AGBR PHOTOGRAPHIC SYSTEMS WITH SCANNING FORCE MICROSCOPY

Within a short time, scanning force microscopy (SFM) has become a usef ul tool in photographic science. The ability of SFM to image insulatin g, beam-sensitive surfaces from the micrometer scale to the atomic sca le is documented for various AgBr photographic systems: polished singl e crystals, microcrystals of different habits, and epitaxial thin film s, nonsensitized and spectrally sensitized. The morphology of the poli shed single crystal is dominated by traces of polishing and surface ar eas having a conchoidal structure. Using SFM, detailed information abo ut the shape and surface structure of different types of AgBr microcry stals, such as tabular grains, cubes, and octahedra, can be obtained d irectly with high lateral, as well as vertical, resolution. On the maj or {111} surfaces of tabular grains, a superstructure is revealed with spacing varying between 5.1 and 5.9 nm. Atomic resolution is achieved on clean surfaces of (001) and (111) oriented AgBr thin films. The im aged surface lattices correspond to the unreconstructed AgBr(hkl) 1 x 1 surfaces. The growth behavior of a merocyanine dye vapor-deposited o n (001) oriented AgBr thin films is discussed.