This study aims to obtain machining characteristics during AFM (Atomic force Microscope) machining of silicon wafers and to monitor the machining states using acoustic emission. As in micro scale machining, two distinct regimes of deformation, i.e. ploughing regime and cutting regime were observed. First, the transition between the two regimes are investigated by analyzing the "pile-up" during machining. As far as in process monitoring is concerned, in the ploughing regime, no chips have been formed and related AE RMS values are relatively low. In the mean time, in the cutting regime, the RMS values are significantly higher than the ploughing regime, with apparent chip formation. From the results, we found out that the proposed scheme can be used for the monitoring of nanomachining, especially for the characterization of nanocutting mode transition.
