STRUCTURE DETERMINATION OF SMALL PARTICLES BY HREM IMAGING - THEORY AND EXPERIMENT

The characterization of the structure of small particles (with a size of a few nanometers) is very important in order to understand their op tical, electronic and magnetic properties. High-resolution electron mi croscopy is a fundamental tool to obtain a full characterization of na nometric particles. In the present work, we report a systematic theore tical study of the HREM images of metallic particles with nanometric s izes. The images of gold clusters with FCC, decahedral, icosahedral an d amorphous structures are reported for a number of orientations with respect to the electron beam. Experimental images of a number of parti cles are reported and compared with the calculated images and Fourier transforms. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V.