AFMWorkshop Celebrates 500 Publications, 400 AFMs and 15 Years
Atomic Force Microscopes are credited with enabling the Nanotechnology Revolution that is impacting all disciplines of science and engineering.
AFMWorkshop Circa 2010: Here's a snap from AFMWorkshop's very first workshop! The company offered "assemble your own AFM" workshops so that customers could learn details about AFM functionality as well save additional funds.
When AFMWorkshop started in 2010, AFMs were so expensive that only central facilities and AFM experts could afford them. But now due to our innovative designs, AFMWorkshop can offer high performance AFMs at very affordable prices.
This business and science journey started over a dinner conversation in 2009 between Paul West, the company’s founder, and Peter Eaton, at that time a staff researcher at the University of Porto. Although Peter had 10 years of experience developing AFM applications in subjects from life sciences to polymers, he was unable to afford an AFM purchase for his lab. Instead, Peter relied on a central imaging facility where the AFM was very expensive to use and often not working; just repairing that AFM cost more than the University could regularly afford.
After being involved with AFMs since their very beginnings, Paul could not rationalize the concept that a researcher like Peter would be left without access to a functional AFM. Paul picked up this challenge and began developing a new way to think about and build AFMs; the goal was not only excellent performance - but also affordable price. AFMWorkshop was born.
AFMWorkshop’s first product, the TT-AFM, sold for about $25,000 and was the first truly affordable AFM. It had good performance and could be used for both research as well as for educating students. As a result, the company expanded rapidly; today there are over 270 TT and TT-2 AFMs used in labs worldwide. You can find TT and TT-2 AFMs on every continent in the world.
Fast forward to 2025, 15 years from the first delivery of a TT AFM. AFMWorkshop has installed 400 AFMs and our customers have published over 500 publications, including publications in high impact journals such as Nature. What’s more, AFMWorkshop now has several AFM products, including its most recent, the HR-AFM. The HR AFM has a noise floor of < 35 picometers and images from the HR AFM are of equal quality to images from much more expensive microscopes.
AFMWorkshop is the only AFM company in the world making AFMs “for scientists and engineers with bigger ideas than budgets”!
Customer #2 Speaks Out
Jorge Caldeira shares his experience with AFMWorkshop and the TT-AFM he built in 2010
AFMWorkshop's Complete Line of Affordable AFMs
Fifeteen years since our launch, AFMWorkshop has grown to offer a complete line of AFM products for Life and Material Sciences, for customers from research, education and industry. Take a look at our robust, affordable and research-grade AFMs.
We have a variety of Refurbish and Upgrade packages available. Users can fully update and re-certify their older AFM, starting at $8,000. Alternatively, AFMWorkshop customers can upgrade a TT or TT-2 to an HR-AFM, starting at $14,995. The HR-AFM noise floor is <35 picometers.
The TT-2 AFM evolved from our first TT AFM. It remains our most popular AFM.
