Structural Characterization of Organics Using Manual and Automated Electron Diffraction

Abstract

In the last decade the importance of transmission electron microscopic studies has become increasingly important with respect to the characterization of organic materials, ranging from small organic molecules to polymers and biological macromolecules. This review will focus on the use of transmission electron microscope to perform electron crystallography experiments, detailing the approaches in acquiring electron crystallographic data. The traditional selected area approach and the recently developed method of automated diffraction tomography (ADT) will be discussed with special attention paid to the handling of electron beam sensitive organic materials.