Modifications of stereological correction methods for precipitate parameters using transmission microscopy

Abstract

Energy filtered transmission electron microscopy (EFTEM), dark field imaging and light microscopy are well established methods to evaluate size, volume fraction and number density of precipitates on different size scales. The stereological problems are well known and analogous for all methods. Many evaluation methods can be found in literature, each of them valid for special sample geometries or special size distributions. Despite this variety, serious errors can occur if the assumptions do not exactly represent the real situation. In this paper, available and newly developed correction methods are tested for evaluating these parameters for different precipitate size distributions in a sample of arbitrary topography. It is shown that the newly proposed methods produce significantly lower deviations and are more assessable regarding their systematic errors.