QUANTITATIVE MICROWAVE NEAR-FIELD MICROSCOPY OF DIELECTRIC-PROPERTIES

A theoretical model analysis for a recently developed scanning evanesc ent microwave microscope has been performed. The result enables a quan titative microscopy of local complex dielectric constant profiles for dielectric materials. Various experiments were performed and found to be in good agreement with the theoretical results. The estimation of i ntrinsic resolution of the microscope suggests that nanometer spatial resolution is achievable. System analysis gives a limiting sensitivity of about delta epsilon/epsilon similar to 1 x 10(-5). (C) 1998 Americ an Institute of Physics. [S0034-6748(98)02711-7].