ABSTRACT
Devices and methods to probe the mechanics of cellular and subcellular components have been a longstanding
interest. Even before the invention of atomic force microscope (AFM), devices such as “cell poker” were specially designed and employed to probe the mechanics of cells growing on a culture dish.1,2 The introduction of AFM has completely changed the landscape of soft matter imaging and probing. Surface force spectroscopy (SFS), based on AFM, is a powerful method to probe the nanomechanical and adhesive properties of surfaces, such as elastic modulus, adhesion, chemical binding, intermolecular/ intramolecular forces, selective interactions, chemical composition, relaxation times, and resilience. Modied SFS techniques are also extremely useful for electrical and thermal characterization of materials. SFS is a form of force spectroscopy (also known as static force spectroscopy) that is limited to probing surfaces (limited to the closest subsurfaces), as opposed to more complicated force spectroscopic measurements, such as deforming and indenting structures, or molecular chain pulling.
