In material Micro/nano mechanics, there are virtually no direct experimental results accessible for analysis of local fracture. In our study, an instrumented ultramicrotome was built for the micro/nano-scaled investigation of local fractures. It makes it possible to quantitatively analysed the effects of material composition, nanostructure, toughening additives, etc. 

With a super sharp (the radius of knife edge r=7 nm) diamond knife, ultrathin chips (down to 30 nm ) can be sliced from the work material (polymers, wood, biomaterial), with sectioning forces recorded by two piezoelectron sensors (up to 0.1 mN).