Picometer-Precision Atomic Position Tracking through Electron Microscopy

Leixin Miao, Adrian Chmielewski, Debangshu Mukherjee, Nasim Alem

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

6 Scopus citations

Abstract

The modern aberration-corrected scanning transmission electron microscopes (AC-STEM) have successfully achieved direct visualization of atomic columns with sub-angstrom resolution. With this significant progress, advanced image quantification and analysis are still at the early stages. In this work, we present the complete pathway for the metrology of atomic resolution scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM) images. This includes (1) tips for acquiring high-quality STEM images; (2) denoising and drift-correction for enhancing measurement accuracy; (3) obtaining initial atomic positions; (4) indexing the atoms based on unit cell vectors; (5) quantifying the atom column positions with either 2D-Gaussian single peak fitting or (6) multi-peak fitting routines for slightly overlapping atomic columns; (7) quantification of lattice distortion/strain within the crystal structures or at the defects/interfaces where the lattice periodicity is disrupted; and (8) some common methods to visualize and present the analysis. Furthermore, a simple self-developed free MATLAB app (EASY-STEM) with a graphical user interface (GUI) will be presented. The GUI can assist in the analysis of STEM images without the need for writing dedicated analysis code or software. The advanced data analysis methods presented here can be applied for the local quantification of defect relaxations, local structural distortions, local phase transformations, and non-centrosymmetry in a wide range of materials.

Original languageEnglish
Article numbere62164
JournalJournal of Visualized Experiments
Volume2021
Issue number173
DOIs
StatePublished - Jul 2021

Funding

L.M. and N.A.'s work supported by the Penn State Center for Nanoscale Sciences, an NSF MRSEC under the grant number DMR-2011839 (2020 - 2026). D.M. was supported by ORNL's Laboratory Directed Research and Development (LDRD) Program, which is managed by UT-Battelle, LLC, for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). A.C. and N.A. acknowledge the Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR) program FA9550-18-1-0277 as well as GAME MURI, 10059059-PENN for support.

FundersFunder number
Penn State Center for Nanoscale Sciences
U.S. Department of Energy
Air Force Office of Scientific ResearchFA9550-18-1-0277, 10059059-PENN
Laboratory Directed Research and Development
Materials Research Science and Engineering Center, Harvard UniversityDMR-2011839 (2020 - 2026

    Fingerprint

    Dive into the research topics of 'Picometer-Precision Atomic Position Tracking through Electron Microscopy'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

    Cite this