Hostname: page-component-77c89778f8-fv566 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-18T21:59:33.664Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Plasmon-Ratio Imaging: A Technique for Enhancing the Contrast of Second Phases with Reduced Diffraction Contrast in TEM Micrographs

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 August 2004

Graham J.C. Carpenter
Graham J.C. Carpenter
Affiliation:
Materials Technology Laboratories, Natural Resources Canada, 568 Booth St., Ottawa K1A 0G1, Canada
Get access

Abstract

A technique is proposed for reducing unwanted diffraction contrast when imaging second phases in crystalline materials using transmission electron microscopy. With the suggested name of plasmon-ratio imaging, the technique uses an energy-filtered imaging system to record and determine a ratio for two images taken at energies in the low loss region. Unlike core-loss imaging, the use of very thin specimens is not required. It is concluded that it is often possible to create a ratio image in which the contrast is dominated by energy loss, that is, chemical differences, rather than by diffraction effects.

Keywords

transmission electron microscopyenergy-filtered imaginglow-loss ratio imagesreduced diffraction contrast
Type
Instrumentation and Techniques
Information
Microscopy and Microanalysis , Volume 10 , Issue 4 , August 2004 , pp. 435 - 441
Copyright
© 2004 Microscopy Society of America

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Bakenfelder, A., Fromm, I., Reimer, L., & Rennekamp, R. (1990). Contrast in the electron spectroscopic imaging mode of a TEM: III, Bragg contrast of crystalline specimens. J Microsc 159, 161–177.Google Scholar
Botton, G.A., L'Esperance, G., Ball, M.D., & Gallerneault, C.E. (1995). Volume fraction measurement of dispersoids in a thin foil by parallel EELS: Development and assessment of the technique. J Microsc 180, 217–229.Google Scholar
Chen, W.R., Triantafillou, J., Beddoes, J., & Zhao, L. (1999). Effect of fully lamellar morphology on creep of a near γ-TiAl intermetallic. Intermetallics 7, 171–178.Google Scholar
Hofer, F., Warbichler, P., & Grogger, W. (1995a). Imaging of nanometer-sized precipitates in solids by electron spectroscopic imaging. Ultramicroscopy 59, 15–31.Google Scholar
Hofer, F., Warbichler, P., Grogger, W., & Lang, O. (1995b). On the application of energy filtering TEM in materials science: I. Precipitates in a Ni/Cr-alloy. Micron 26, 377–390.Google Scholar
Moore, K.T., Howe, J.M., & Elbert, D.C. (1999). Analysis of diffraction contrast as a function of energy loss in energy-filtered transmission electron microscope imaging. Unltramicroscopy 80, 203–219.Google Scholar
Pennycook, S.J. (1989). High-resolution imaging with large-angle elastically scattered electrons. Electron Microsc Soc Am Bull 19, 67–73.Google Scholar
Pennycook, S.J. & Boatner, L.A. (1988). Chemically sensitive structure-imaging with a scanning transmission electron microscope. Nature 336, 565–567.Google Scholar