Tranmission Electron Microscopy with a Liquid Flow Cell

Abstract

The imaging of microscopic structures at nanometer-scale spatial resolution in a liquid environment is of interest for a wide range of studies. Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) provides a method for imaging with the requisite spatial resolution, but such imaging can be accomplished only with a means of isolating the liquid environment from the high vacuum of the instrument column, such as an impermeable cell with electron transparent windows. Recently, a liquid flow cell TEM holder equipped with a miniaturized viewing chamber has been developed and applied to the detection of high atomic number labeling nanoparticles by scanning TEM high-angle annular dark-field imaging. Here we demonstrate the application of the flow cell system for conventional TEM bright-field imaging of immobilized nanoparticles in a liquid of micrometer thickness.