Microcantilever sensor has gained much popularity because of its high sensitivity and selectivity. It consists of a micro-sized cantilever that is usually coated on one side with chemical/biological probe agents to generate strong attraction to target molecules. The interactions between the probe and target molecules induce surface stress that bends the microcantilever.

This current work applied the molecular dynamics simulation to study the microcantilever system. Lennard-Jones potentials were used to model the target-target and target-probe interactions and bond bending potentials to model the solid cantilever beam. In addition, this work studied the effect of probe locations on the microcantilever deflection.

The simulation results suggest that both target-target and target-probe interactions as well as the probe locations affect the arrangement of the bonds;​ in term of the bonding number, the area containing the bonded molecules, and the distances between them. All these factors influence the microcantilever deflection.