Near‐field scanning optical microscopy II

A brief survey of the principles of near‐field optical imaging will be presented. Selected examples of super resolution imaging using visible reflected light will demonstrate that lateral resolution far smaller than the illumination wavelength can be achieved and that the technique is surface sensitive. In addition, we will demonstrate that subwavelength resolution can be achieved in the near‐infrared spectral regime and that near‐field scanning optical microscopy (NSOM) can be used in diagnostic inspection of hetrojunction laser modal emission patterns.