Unique Electron Microscope Being Installed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory
June 18, 2004
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This image shows a diffraction pattern of silicon [Si(111)] captured by the aberration-corrected electron microscope being installed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The (440) reflection at the bottom shows sub-Ångstrom resolution. |
Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) has announced that it is installing one of the nation's first aberration-corrected electron microscopes (ACEM), a combined scanning transmission and conventional transmission instrument, at the Laboratory's new Advanced Microscopy Laboratory. The ACEM will permit imaging of crystal structures with sub-Ångstrom resolution, and will provide the ability to do chemical species identification at the single atom level.
The ACEM will serve not only the user community at ORNL, which supports EERE programs, but also researchers from industry and university who participate in the High Temperature Materials Laboratory's national user program. It will be used to characterize materials for such varied automotive applications as improved lean oxides of nitrogen (NOx) catalysts, nano-particulate reinforcements for composite structures, and high-density hydrogen storage materials.