SThM of Hard Disk Read/Write Head

Scanning Thermal Microscopy (SThM) image of the R/W head from a commercial hard drive. SThM data is overlaid as color on the rendered surface topography, with darker regions exhibiting higher thermal conductivity. The difference in temperature between the yellow and orange regions is ~0.02°C. Polishing lines are clearly resolved in the topography. Imaged with the MFP-3D, 8.5 µm scan.