Quantitative approaches for multiscale structural analysis with atomic resolution electron microscopy
Phys. Rev. Materials 9, 093802 – Published 5 September, 2025
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/xdf6-31xf
Abstract
Atomic-resolution imaging with scanning transmission electron microscopy is a powerful tool for characterizing the nanoscale structure of materials, in particular features such as defects, local strains, and symmetry-breaking distortions. In addition to advanced instrumentation, the effectiveness of the technique depends on computational image analysis to extract meaningful features from complex datasets recorded in experiments, which can be complicated by the presence of noise and artifacts, small or overlapping features, and the need to scale analysis over large representative areas. Here, we present image analysis approaches which synergize real and reciprocal space information to efficiently and reliably obtain meaningful structural information with picometer scale precision across hundreds of nanometers of material from atomic-resolution electron microscope images. Damping superstructure peaks in reciprocal space allows symmetry-breaking structural distortions to be disentangled from other sources of inhomogeneity and measured with high precision. Real-space fitting of the wavelike signals resulting from Fourier filtering enables absolute quantification of lattice parameter variations and strain, as well as the uncertainty associated with these measurements. Implementations of these algorithms are made available as an open source python package.
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New Insights into Functional Materials through Advanced Electron Microscopy
The Editors of Physical Review Materials are pleased to present the Collection on New Insights into Functional Materials through Advanced Electron Microscopy, highlighting cutting-edge microscopy techniques and the extraordinary advances in materials science and engineering that they enable. The Collection is being guest-edited by Joanne Etheridge from Monash University (Australia) and Yimei Zhu from Brookhaven National Laboratory (USA). Every article published in this collection underwent a rigorous peer review process, adhering to the same high standards applied to all papers. The Physical Review Materials editorial team managed the peer review and made all editorial decisions.
