open access

https://hdl.handle.net/2115/86148

Feasibility of control of particle assembly by dielectrophoresis in liquid-cell transmission electron microscopy

英語

alternating current electric field

2022-04-23

Oxford University Press

Microscopy

71(4)

231-237

Liquid-cell transmission electron microscopy (LC-TEM) is a useful technique for observing phenomena in liquid samples with spatial and temporal resolutions similar to those of conventional transmission electron microscopy (TEM). This method is therefore expected to permit the visualization of phenomena previously inaccessible to conventional optical microscopy. However, dynamic processes such as nucleation are difficult to observe by this method because of difficulties in controlling the condition of the sample liquid in the observation area. To approach this problem, we focused on dielectrophoresis, in which electrodes are used to assemble particles, and we investigated the phenomena that occurred when an alternating-current signal was applied to an electrode in an existing liquid cell by using a phase-contrast optical microscope (PCM) and TEM. In PCM, we observed that colloidal particles in a solution were attracted to the electrodes to form assemblies, that the particles aligned along the electric field to form pearl chains and that the pearl chains accumulated to form colloidal crystals. However, these phenomena were not observed in the TEM study because of differences in the design of the relevant holders. The results of our study imply that the particle assembly by using dielectrophoretic forces in LC-TEM should be possible, but further studies, including electric device development, will be required to realize this in practice.

学術雑誌論文

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© The Author(s) 2022. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Japanese Society of Microscopy.This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License(https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/)

2050-5698