Michal Swierczewski, Alexis Chenneviere, Lay-Theng Lee, Plinio Maroni, Thomas Bürgi Langmuir-Blodgett (LB) technique allows the deposition of gold nanoclusters (atomically precise nanoparticles below 2 nm in diameter) onto solid substrates with an unprecedented degree of control and high transfer ratios. Nanoclusters are expected to follow the crinkle folding mechanism, which promotes the formation of trilayers but kinetically disfavors the formation of the fourth layer.

The SNOM (Scanning Near-field Optical Microscopy) allows to reach a spatial resolution well below the wavelength of the light used. Indeed, thanks to the "near-field" illumination (when the distance between the object and the source is much less than the wavelength) it becomes possible to avoid the diffraction inherent to every optical system.