MSE Seminar: Direct Imaging of Short-range Order (SRO) and its Role in Deformation with New Electron Microscopy Techniques

Abstract: This talk will highlight recent advances in Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM) techniques that provide insight into small-scale plasticity and the evolution of defect structures in materials. Through the development of fast direct electron detectors, it is now possible to acquire large multidimensional data sets of nanodiffraction patterns (4D-STEM) that can map local structural order and strain with nanometer precision, even during in situ nanomechanical testing. The method is widely applicable and examples will be given from systems such as organic semiconductor molecular thin films, structural alloys with local order such as Ti-Al and CrCoNi medium entropy alloys, and even amorphous samples such as bulk metallic glass. This talk will describe our recent results utilizing fast direct electron detectors, energy-filtered imaging and in situ TEM nanomechanical testing that provide insight into the role of short-range order (SRO) in materials deformation phenomena using these techniques.

Bio: Andrew Minor is a professor at the University of California, Berkeley in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, and also holds a joint appointment at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, where he is the facility director of the National Center for Electron Microscopy in the Molecular Foundry. He received a B.A. in economics and mechanical engineering from Yale University and his M.S. and Ph.D. in materials science and engineering from U.C. Berkeley. He has co-authored over 190 publications and presented over 130 invited talks on topics such as nanomechanics, lightweight alloy development, characterization of soft materials and in situ TEM technique development. His honors include the LBL Materials Science Division Outstanding Performance Award (2006 & 2010), the AIME Robert Lansing Hardy Award from TMS (2012) and the Burton Medal from the Microscopy Society of America (2015).

Host: Will Bowman