Electron Optic Documents

The F2 is a new concept of 20-200kV TEM equipped with a Cold FEG. This new generation of multi-purpose electron microscope is designed specifically to meet today’s diversified needs. Transmission electron microscopy gives access to two-dimensional information coming from the sample. The third dimension is available thanks to the tomography technique. The sample is tilted and for each step, an image (TEM, STEM, EDS) is acquired. Then the 3D volume of the sample can be reconstructed. The F2 has a “Dual SDD system”, which is composed of two silicon drift detectors (SDD) with large sensor areas, resulting in a total solid angle of 1.7 sr. The combination of two detectors and their placement around the sample, allows the ability to record EDS information throughout the full tilt series (from -80° to +80°).

The F2 is a new concept of 20-200kV TEM equipped with a Cold FEG. This new generation of multi-purpose electron microscope is designed specifically to meet today’s diversified needs. Thanks to the high brightness and small probe size of the Cold FEG, the F2 is able to reach an unprecedented guaranteed resolution for STEM (0.14nm), EDS (1.7sr) and EELS (0.3eV) at the same time, creating a new class of high-end non-corrected TEM.

The F2 is a new concept of 20-200kV TEM equipped with a Cold FEG. This new generation of multi-purpose electron microscope is designed specifically to meet today’s diversified needs. Thanks to the high brightness and small probe size of the Cold FEG, the F2 is able to reach an unprecedented guaranteed resolution for STEM (0.14nm), EDS (1.7sr) and EELS (0.3eV) at the same time; creating a new class of high-end non-corrected TEM.

The F2 is a new concept of 20-200kV TEM. This new generation of multi-purpose electron microscope is designed specifically to meet today's diversified needs. Thanks to the high brightness and small probe size, the F2 is able to reach an unprecedented guaranteed resolution for STEM (0.14nm), EDS (1.7sr) and EELS (0.3eV) at the same time, creating a new class of high-end non-corrected TEM.

The F2 incorporates a new, intuitive user interface specifically designed for analytical electron microscopy. This new interface integrates many improvements for the TEM control, such as; automatic functions (auto brightness/contrast, auto focus, auto Z, auto stigmator), coma free auto alignment and off-line data processing (Analysis Center). The software can be tuned at your convenience to provide you with the best working environment.

Contamination and Off-Flavor; Evaluation and Analysis

One of the main imaging artifacts generated during specimen observation in SEM is specimen charging. The effect of charging manifests itself either via ‘flattening’ of the image due to the beam deflection close to the source of charging, or extremely high or low contrast and image distortion. This artifact can be substantially reduced by either application of conductive coating to the sample or by lowering the primary beam voltage. Contemporary FE-SEMs have the ability to produce nm size spot sizes even at 1kV and below, paving the way for high resolution imaging and analysis of nanomaterials and surfaces without the need for conductive coating.

Resolution can be improved for all accelerating voltages.

Using a multi-hole imaging scheme, researchers have been able to reach a hitherto unprecedented milestone of 20,000 images/day on both a CRYO ARM™ 300 II and a JEM-F200. Given that many structures on EMPIAR have required around 5000 images, essentially 4-5 projects can be accomplished on a daily basis, which opens up new opportunities for routine high resolution structure determination at unprecedented levels.

High resolution structure determination by electron cryo-microscopy (cryoEM) and Single Particle Analysis (SPA) has progressed to the point where structures can routinely be determined to be better than 2Å resolution using either a 200 or a 300 kV microscope. At 1.8Å resolution, details like amino acid isoforms can be distinguished. This application note highlights improved results that were obtained on apoferritin at 1.34Å resolution that hint at new features.