In order to understand the basic process of a laser-illuminated scanning pr
obe tip it is necessary to calculate the temperature distribution in such a
geometry. In the first part of this paper the temperature distribution in
a laser-heated tip and a semi-infinite metallic sample is solved in a stead
y-state approach. This is done with the help of the boundary element method
. In a second part, the temperature field in a thin metal sheet attached to
a semi-infinite dielectric substrate is calculated by applying the Fourier
-Bessel transformation method.