Alignment of electron optical beam shaping elements using a convolutional neural network

We propose to use the recently introduced orbital angular momentum spectrometer in a transmission electron microscope to perform electron magnetic chiral dichroism experiments, dispersing the inelastically scattered electrons from a magnetic material in both energy and angular momentum. The technique offers several advantages over previous formulations of electron magnetic chiral dichroism as it requires much simpler experimental conditions in terms of specimen orientation and thickness. A simulation algorithm, based on the multislice description of the beam propagation, is used to anticipate the advantages of the approach over current electron magnetic chiral dichroism implementations. Numerical calculations confirm an increased magnetic signal to noise ratio with in plane atomic resolution.

Orbital angular momentum resolved electron magnetic chiral dichroism

This study proposes a comprehensive theory for the propagation of structured electron beams along atomic columns in crystals, by means of classical multislice and reformulated Bloch-wave algorithms, in the context of transmission electron microscopy. In particular, by making use of the symmetries of Bessel beams and Gaussian beams, the authors offer a clear description of the oscillatory behavior of the electron probe, including the dephasing of such an oscillation. This result provides a fresh methodological approach for the study of electron channeling, for the engineering of any desired depth behavior within a crystal, based on the initial probe shape.

https://link.aps.org/accepted/10.1103/PhysRevApplied.11.044072

Electron-Beam Shaping in the Transmission Electron Microscope: Control of Electron-Beam Propagation Along Atomic Columns

Abstract Scanning transmission electron microscopy is now the primary tool for exploring functional materials on the atomic level. Often, features of interest are highly localized in specific regions in the material, such as ferroelectric domain walls, extended defects, or second phase inclusions. Selecting regions to image for structural and chemical discovery via atomically resolved imaging has traditionally proceeded via human operators making semi-informed judgements on sampling locations and parameters. Recent efforts at automation for structural and physical discovery have pointed towards the use of ‘active learning’ methods that utilize Bayesian optimization with surrogate models to quickly find relevant regions of interest. Yet despite the potential importance of this direction, there is a general lack of certainty in selecting relevant control algorithms and how to balance a priori knowledge of the material system with knowledge derived during experimentation. Here we address this gap by developing the automated experiment workflows with several combinations to both illustrate the effects of these choices and demonstrate the tradeoffs associated with each in terms of accuracy, robustness, and susceptibility to hyperparameters for structural discovery. We discuss possible methods to build descriptors using the raw image data and deep learning based semantic segmentation, as well as the implementation of variational autoencoder based representation. Furthermore, each workflow is applied to a range of feature sizes including NiO pillars within a La:SrMnO 3 matrix, ferroelectric domains in BiFeO 3 , and topological defects in graphene. The code developed in this manuscript is open sourced and will be released at github.com/nccreang/AE_Workflows . 

/pdf/towards-automating-structural-discovery-in-scanning-1ijeqsm6.pdf

Towards automating structural discovery in scanning transmission electron microscopy <sup>*</sup>

In this work we report on a detailed analysis of the propagation of high energy electron beams having different shapes in a model system, namely [100] oriented zincblende GaN crystal. The analyses are based on the comparison between a reformulated Bloch wave and multislice simulations and mainly focus on Bessel beams. In fact, considering the simplicity of the Bessel beam momentum spectrum and the symmetry of the material it is possible in some cases to give a simple description of the propagation and explain it on the bases of the free space properties of each beam. This analysis permits a deeper understanding of the channeling phenomena and of the probe intensity oscillation along the propagation direction. For comparison we will also consider two additional relevant cases of the well-known aperture limited beams and a newly introduced Gaussian probes. The latter can be shown to be the optimal probe for coupling to 1s Bloch states and obtain minimal spread along columns.

Electron beam shaping: how to control the e-beam propagation along atomic columns

In this paper we prove that any conformal transformation of a wave can be produced via a suitably arranged cascade of two, or at most four, discrete phase elements satisfying Laplace's equation. Although this result is of general applicability, in the case of charged-matter waves it implies that such transformations can be exactly obtained by employing only electrostatic or magnetostatic phase elements. Furthermore, we illustrate how a basis for such generating phase elements is given by integer and fractional charge multipoles, proving that these transformations can be used to perform the efficient sorting of multipole-induced quantum states. This provides a fast, compact, and direct method to measure the strength and orientation of dipole systems and of astigmatism. It thus adds a further observable to the four whose spectrum can already be directly measured via spatial separation on the detector, i.e., position, momentum, energy, and orbital angular momentum. The results hold true in optics and for all kinds of charged-particle beams of sufficient coherence.

https://link.aps.org/pdf/10.1103/PhysRevApplied.15.054028

Arbitrary Conformal Transformations of Wave Functions

Imaging of biomolecules by ionizing radiation, such as electrons, causes radiation damage which introduces structural and compositional changes of the specimen. The total number of high-energy electrons per surface area that can be used for imaging in cryogenic electron microscopy (cryo-EM) is severely restricted due to radiation damage, resulting in low signal-to-noise ratios (SNR). High resolution details are dampened by the transfer function of the microscope and detector, and are the first to be lost as radiation damage alters the individual molecules which are presumed to be identical during averaging. As a consequence, radiation damage puts a limit on the particle size and sample heterogeneity with which electron microscopy (EM) can deal. Since a transmission EM (TEM) image is formed from the scattering process of the electron by the specimen interaction potential, radiation damage is inevitable. However, we can aim to maximize the information transfer for a given dose and increase the SNR by finding alternatives to the conventional phase-contrast cryo-EM techniques. Here some alternative transmission electron microscopy techniques are reviewed, including phase plate, multi-pass transmission electron microscopy, off-axis holography, ptychography and a quantum sorter. Their prospects for providing more or complementary structural information within the limited lifetime of the sample are discussed.

/pdf/single-particle-cryo-em-alternative-schemes-to-improve-dose-ejhim04ovq.pdf

Single-particle cryo-EM: alternative schemes to improve dose efficiency

/pdf/propagation-of-bessel-beams-along-atomic-columns-in-crystal-1dt5h1bos2.pdf

Propagation of Bessel Beams along Atomic Columns in Crystal: a Bloch Wave and Multi-slice Analysis

In quantum mechanics, entanglement and correlations are not just a mere sporadic curiosity, but rather common phenomena at the basis of an interacting quantum system. In electron microscopy, such concepts have not been extensively explored yet in all their implications; in particular, inelastic scattering can be reanalyzed in terms of correlation between the electron beam and the sample. While classical inelastic scattering simply implies loss of coherence in the electron beam, performing a joint measurement on the electron beam and the sample excitation could restore the coherence and the lost information. Here, we propose to exploit joint measurement in electron microscopy for a surprising and counter-intuitive application of the concept of ghost imaging. Ghost imaging, first proposed in quantum photonics, can be applied partially in electron microscopy by performing joint measurement between the portion of the transmitted electron beam and a photon emitted from the sample reaching a bucket detector. This would permit us to form a one-dimensional virtual image of an object that even has not interacted with the electron beam directly. This technique is extremely promising for low-dose imaging that requires the minimization of radiation exposure for electron-sensitive materials, because the object interacts with other form of waves, e.g., photons/surface plasmon polaritons, and not the electron beam. We demonstrate this concept theoretically for any inelastic electron-sample interaction in which the electron excites a single quantum of a collective mode, such as a photon, plasmon, phonon, magnon, or any optical polariton.

E. Rotunno

Papers

Electron-Beam Shaping in the Transmission Electron Microscope: Control of Electron-Beam Propagation Along Atomic Columns

Arbitrary Conformal Transformations of Wave Functions

Single-particle cryo-EM: alternative schemes to improve dose efficiency

Propagation of Bessel Beams along Atomic Columns in Crystal: a Bloch Wave and Multi-slice Analysis

One-dimensional ghost imaging with an electron microscope: a route towards ghost imaging with inelastically scattered electrons