Stroboscopic Ultrafast Imaging Capabilities Using RF Strip-lines in a Commercial Transmission Electron Microscope

Published

May 1, 2022

Author(s)

Spencer Reisbick, Myung-Geun Han, Chuhang Liu, yubin zhao, Eric Montgomery, Vikrant Gokhale, Jason J. Gorman, Chunguang Jing, June W. Lau, Yimei Zhu

Abstract

The development of ultrafast electron microscopy (UEM), specifically stroboscopic imaging, has brought the study of structural dynamics to a new level by overcoming the spatial limitations of ultrafast spectroscopy and the temporal restrictions of traditional TEM simultaneously. Combining the concepts governing both techniques has enabled direct visualization of dynamics with spatiotemporal resolutions in the picosecond-nanometer regime. Here, we push the limits of imaging using a pulsed electron beam via RF induced transverse deflection based on the newly developed 200 keV frequency-tunable strip-line pulser. We demonstrate 0.2 nm spatial resolution at high magnifications and elucidation of Lorentz imaging using the phase-microscopy method. We also present beam coherence measurements and expand our study using the breathing modes of a silicon interdigitated comb under RF excitation which achieves improved temporal synchronization between the electron pulse-train and electric field. A new RF holder has also been developed with impedance matching to the RF signal to minimize transmission power loss to samples and its performance is compared with a conventional sample holder.

Citation

Ultramicroscopy

Volume

235

Pub Type

Journals

Download Paper

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ultramic.2022.113497

Local Download

Keywords

Ultrafast electron microscopy, electron pulser, frequency-tunable RF excitation, time-resolved stroboscopic imaging, coherent electron pulses.

Citation

Reisbick, S. , Han, M. , Liu, C. , zhao, Y. , Montgomery, E. , Gokhale, V. , Gorman, J. , Jing, C. , Lau, J. and Zhu, Y. (2022), Stroboscopic Ultrafast Imaging Capabilities Using RF Strip-lines in a Commercial Transmission Electron Microscope, Ultramicroscopy, [online], https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ultramic.2022.113497, https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=934282 (Accessed October 9, 2025)