What Can the TEM Tell You About Your Nanomaterial?
In this tutorial, I will present a brief overview of the ways that transmission electron microscopy can be used to characterize nanoscale materials. This tutorial will emphasize what TEM does well, as well where difficulties arise. In particular, I will discuss in an overview manner how diffraction, imaging and spectroscopy function in the TEM, and how these techniques can be combined to provide a detailed characterization of nanoscale structures. Some emphasis on sample preparation requirements, image artifacts and low sampling statistics will be detailed as well. I hope that at the end of this brief tutorial, you will have a better sense as to when the TEM might help you answer particular questions in your research.