New methods and structure characterisation by electron crystallography. 2015.

The project contains two parts:

1. Develop a fully automatic method for collecting and processing rotation electron diffraction data from nano-materials.

2. Structure determination of porous materials by electron crystallography.

Porous materials usually have large unit cells, which causes severe peak overlapping problem in the structure determination by powder X-ray diffraction. Electron crystallography can provide lots of complimentary information which facilitates the structure determination by powder X-ray diffraction. Porous materials offer challenges when it comes to collect high quality diffraction patterns and HREM images since they are often very unstable in the electron beam. Determination of unit cell parameters and space groups will be made from diffraction patterns.

 

We will also develop electron tomography method and apply it to study hiearchical zeolite materials. We will combine both advantages to solve complicated porous materials, such as MOFs, zeolites etc. The materials could be synthesized inside the center or outside EXSELENT.

 

Objectives:

• Further develop the rotation electron diffraction method and software for automatic collection and data processing of 3D electron diffraction data.

• Develop 3D electron tomography method to study hierarchical zeolite structures.

• To use the RED method to study porous materials.

• To characterize the structures of new porous materials by combining the new method and other electron crystallographic methods, for example image processing.