The success of the Springer Series Applied Scanning Probe Methods I-VII and the rapidly expanding activities in scanning probe development and applications worldwide made it a natural step to collect further speci c results in the elds of development of scanning probe microscopy techniques (Vol. VIII), characterization (Vol. IX), and biomimetics and industrial applications (Vol. X). These three volumes complement the previous set of volumes under the subject topics and give insight into the recent work of leading specialists in their respective elds. Following the tradition of the series, the...