The Raman/AFM technique has two approaches: aperture and apertureless, and the apertureless mode is realized with SERS and TERS. Figure 5 is the example of an integrated TERS system. It shows that there are five main components for a whole integrated TERS (apertureless) system. These components are: microscope, one objective lens, one integrated AFM head, a Raman spectrometer and a CCD. The laser is focused on the sample, on piezo-stage and the AFM tip by the moving the laser beam along the tip. The movement of the laser beam is achieved by the mirror in the top left corner. The XYZ piezo-stage in the left bottom holds the sample. In this design, the laser beam is focused on the sample through an objective lens, and the scattered light is collected by the same lens.
This setup utilizes a low contact-pressure to reduce the damage to the AFM tip and sample. The laser power is typically below 1 mW. The notch filter can filter Rayleigh scattering from the excitation laser light from the back of the cantilever. The laser beam is focused on the apex of the gold-coated AFM tip and the sample. The laser scanning is completed by the moving the mirror across the approaching tip. A small enhance in background occurs when the laser spot focuses on the tip area. The movement of the XYZ piezo-stage finishes the sample scanning. The wide red signal is Raman signal which is collected through the objective lens. The same lens is also used for excitation of the sample and collecting the Raman signal.