State of the art in atomic resolution off-axis electron holography

Abstract

As proposed by Hannes Lichte, to resolve structure–property relations not only the question “Which atom is where?” but also the question “Which fields are around?” has to be answered. High-resolution off-axis electron holography opens up an access to these key questions in that it allows accessing the complete exit-wave of the object provided within the information limit of the microscope, i.e. amplitude and phase including atomic details such as position and species, and moreover, information about large area electric potentials and magnetic fields, which a conventional transmission electron microscope is blind for—also when using a Cs-corrector. For an excellent object exit-wave reconstruction, special care has to be taken on the hologram quality, i.e. interference fringe contrast and electron dose. Severe restrictions are given to signal resolution by the limited brightness of the electron source. Utilizing a new high-brightness Schottky field electron emitter in a state-of-the-art transmission electron microscope operated at 300 kV, the phase signal resolution at atomic resolution can significantly be enhanced. An improvement by at least a factor of 2.88 compared to the most recently reported single hologram at atomic resolution is found. To proof the applicability of this setup to real materials science problems, a grain boundary of gold has been investigated holographically. ► Impact of the brightness on the reconstructed signal in electron holography. ► Factor 2.8 gain in signal quality by setup with a high brightness electron gun. ► Investigation of a grain boundary in gold with a state-of-the-art holography setup. ► A-posteriori aberration fine-tuning for true one Angstrom resolution in the object wave. ► Mistilt analysis on the atomic scale by numerical wave optics.