Efficient phase contrast imaging in STEM using a pixelated detector. Part 1: experimental demonstration at atomic resolution.

We demonstrate a method to achieve high efficiency phase contrast imaging in aberration corrected scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM) with a pixelated detector. The pixelated detector is used to record the Ronchigram as a function of probe position which is then analyzed with ptychography. Ptychography has previously been used to provide super-resolution beyond the diffraction limit of the optics, alongside numerically correcting for spherical aberration.

Scanning transmission electron microscopy: Albert Crewe's vision and beyond.

Some four decades were needed to catch up with the vision that Albert Crewe and his group had for the scanning transmission electron microscope (STEM) in the nineteen sixties and seventies: attaining 0.5Å resolution, and identifying single atoms spectroscopically. With these goals now attained, STEM developments are turning toward new directions, such as rapid atomic resolution imaging and exploring atomic bonding and electronic properties of samples at atomic resolution.

Atom-by-atom structural and chemical analysis by annular dark-field electron microscopy.

Direct imaging and chemical identification of all the atoms in a material with unknown three-dimensional structure would constitute a very powerful general analysis tool. Transmission electron microscopy should in principle be able to fulfil this role, as many scientists including Feynman realized early on. It images matter with electrons that scatter strongly from individual atoms and whose wavelengths are about 50 times smaller than an atom.

High-energy-resolution monochromator for aberration-corrected scanning transmission electron microscopy/electron energy-loss spectroscopy.

An all-magnetic monochromator/spectrometer system for sub-30 meV energy-resolution electron energy-loss spectroscopy in the scanning transmission electron microscope is described. It will link the energy being selected by the monochromator to the energy being analysed by the spectrometer, without resorting to decelerating the electron beam. This will allow it to attain spectral energy stability comparable to systems using monochromators and spectrometers that are raised to near the high voltage of the instrument.