Nanomanipulation using only mechanical energy

We present the first computational study targeting the nanomanipulation capability of dynamic surface force microscopy. Using a very simple but challenging model, an antisite defect on a III-V(110) surface, we show how the defect can be manipulated in both the attractive and the repulsive modes and identify the role of the tip-sample interaction: either lowering the barriers or pushing the system over a high stress state using exclusively the mechanical energy stored in the oscillating cantilever. Our study also sheds light on other key issues, such as chemical resolution, explaining why vacancies are the only defects imaged in topography, and dissipation contrast formation, identifying a physical mechanism to explain the intriguing small shift between topographical and damping images.