NANOSECOND TRANSMISSION ELECTRON-MICROSCOPY AND DIFFRACTION

A conventional TEM was extended to a time-resolving instrument by installing a pulsed microchannel plate as a low-cost time-resolving image detector and a pulsed electron beam shutter. The technique provides electron micrographs and diffraction pictures of non-recurring events on the nanosecond/micrometer scale within a commercial TEM. The voltage pulses for the channel plate were produced with a Marx generator, based on two cascades of avalanche transistors connected in parallel, and either a Krytron tube or a cascade of avalanche transistors, functioning as a grounding switch. Variable pulse widths were produced by triggering the Marx generator and the grounding switch with two pulses of variable delay.