Electronics Compartment

The electronics compartment - accessible through the back and side doors (see also Figure 36) - hosts most components of the NanoFrazor Explore control electronics in a 19-inch rack: main controller, high speed piezo controller, environment controller, and positioning controller.

Other electronic components are the NanoFrazor PC (outside, see also Figure 48 or Figure 49) and the preamplifier box (located within the storage compartment).

Main controller

The main controller contains the electronics board with the real-time control system. The realtime control system synchronizes the fine positioning with the patterning and imaging process. A firmware update can be performed by exchanging the respective files on the SD card.

High speed piezo controller

The high speed piezo controller contains the closed-loop control system of the high speed piezoscanners. It receives the respective target positions from the main controller.

Environment controller

The environment controller contains the electronics to control the light of the housing and the optical microscope. Furthermore, it contains electronics to control the valves in the gas compartment.

Positioning controller

The positioning controller contains the electronics that control NanoFrazor’s positioning system.

Preamplifier box

The preamplifier box contains electronics for conditioning and amplifying the signals originating from the thermal cantilever. In order to minimize the noise that might be introduced before signal amplification, the box is situated directly below NanoFrazor’s mechanics on the bottom of the granite plate and is well separated from the other controllers in the electronics compartment.

NanoFrazor PC

The NanoFrazor PC runs the NanoFrazor host application. It provides the user interface for controlling the entire NanoFrazor Explore.