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OpenFovea: open-source AFM data processing software

Nature Methods volume 9, pages 774–775 (2012)Cite this article

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The atomic force microscope (AFM) is often used to detect specific molecules on the surfaces of specimens1 and to measure a specimen's mechanical properties2. This information can be deduced from the force-distance curves generated by the deflection of the cantilever as it approaches, indents and recedes from the sample. Force-volume images can be generated from a series of successive force-distance curves recorded while scanning an area of the specimen (Supplementary Fig. 1). This imaging mode has been used since 1997 to image, among others, proteins at molecular resolution, molecular patterns, bacteria, fungi and living cells2. Algorithms for processing force-volume data files have been published3, but there is no universal ready-to-use software for analysis of force-distance curves, and investigators must develop their own custom software.

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Figure 1: Processing and display capabilities of OpenFovea.

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Acknowledgements

We thank the Python community for providing such high-quality development toolkits. C.R. thanks G. Witz, G. Longo and M. Favre for their constructive discussions. This work was supported by the Indo-Swiss Joint Research Program (grant 122 941) and the Swiss National Science Foundation (grant nos. 200021- 118147 and CR32I3-130676).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Département de Biologie Cellulaire et de Morphologie, Université de Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland

    Charles Roduit, Andrea Volterra & Sandor Kasas

  2. National Centre for Cell Science, Ganeshkhind, Pune, India

    Bhaskar Saha

  3. Institut de Physique des Systèmes Biologiques, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland

    Livan Alonso-Sarduy, Giovanni Dietler & Sandor Kasas

Authors
  1. Charles Roduit
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  2. Bhaskar Saha
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  3. Livan Alonso-Sarduy
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  4. Andrea Volterra
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  5. Giovanni Dietler
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  6. Sandor Kasas
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Charles Roduit.

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Supplementary information

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Roduit, C., Saha, B., Alonso-Sarduy, L. et al. OpenFovea: open-source AFM data processing software. Nat Methods 9, 774–775 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmeth.2112

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