PURPOSE: To avoid the collision of a probe with a protrusion part, to quickly move the probe and to shorten the measuring time of the microscope by a method wherein a shortest movement route which can bypass the protrusion part on the surface of a sample is selected on the basis of the three-dimensional shape on the surface of the sample.
CONSTITUTION: A shape recognition part 10b draws a contour-line image from an image stored in an image memory 10a by connecting parts which are focused and bright because they are situated on the same height as the tip of a probe 6 on a sample 1. It judges that the parts are protrusion parts and that parts other than them are recessed parts. Then, a probe-movement control part 10c selects a shortest movement route which can bypass the protrusion parts on the surface of the sample 1 on the basis of the contour-line image. A probe control device 11 controls a fine movement mechanism 7 and an X-Y stage 2 on the basis of the signal of the control means 10c, it relatively moves the probe 6 along the shortest movement route, it scans the surface of the sample 1 and it forms a microimage in a measuring region. Thereby, an operation to raise the probe 6 is omitted, its movement time is shortened, and the collision of the probe 6 with the protrusion parts can be avoided.
| JPH0579814 | SCANNING-PROBE TYPE MICROSCOPE |
| JPH0271105 | APPARATUS FOR MEASURING SURFACE SHAPE |
TSURUMUNE TOKUJI
OKUDA KOJI
ISHIKAWA MIYUKI
