Structure determination using convergent-beam electron diffraction

Abstract

There are many different approaches in quantitative electron diffraction which are being vigorously pursued at present. The approach we adopt is based on the insights provided by the Bloch-wave formulation of dynamical electron diffraction theory into the physics of dynamical scattering. This insight is used to select diffraction situations where a pseudo-kinematical approximation may be made. A forwards route is then possible directly from the experimental observations to the structural implications. This contrasts with the model-building, multi-parameter fitting procedures used in many other approaches where a problem of uniqueness inevitably arises.Because the pseudo-kinematical approach ignores many of the detailed dynamical interactions which occur locally over small angular ranges we do not attempt to make accurate measurements, and wherever possible average (visually at least) along Bragg lines to eliminate local perturbations. In a sense the work resembles early X-ray crystallography where reflections were put in one of six or so classes from very weak to very strong.