On the heat exchange between a probing nanoparticle and a surface through near-field modes of a fluctuational electromagnetic field

Heat exchange between a nanoparticle (representing the probe of a scanning microscope) and a solid surface in a range of distances from zero to several microns is considered in a relativistic approximation. It is shown that the role of the time lag increases with the conductivity of materials and the distance from particle to surface. The heat flux is always smaller than that obtained in the nonrelativistic approximation. Maximum heating is expected for high-resistivity materials. (C) 2002 MAIK "Nauka / Interperiodica".