Unique X-ray microscope paves the way to more powerful batteries

New insights into the morphological and chemical changes in battery materials

21-Nov-2024 - New cathode materials are being developed to further increase the capacity of lithium batteries. Multilayer lithium-rich transition metal oxides (LRTMOs) offer particularly high energy density. However, their capacity decreases with each charging cycle due to structural and chemical changes. ...

3D-snapshots of nanoparticles

The crucial point is that the snapshots acn be taken in free flight

07-Mar-2023 - ETH researchers have managed to take three-​dimensional pictures of single nanoparticles using extremely short and strong X-​ray pulses. In the future this technique could even be used to make 3D-​movies of dynamical processes at the nanoscale. X-​ray diffraction has been used for more than a ...

Tomography shows high potential of copper sulphide solid-state batteries

Processes during charging and discharging observed

30-Nov-2022 - Solid-state batteries enable even higher energy densities than lithium-ion batteries with high safety. A team led by Prof. Philipp Adelhelm and Dr. Ingo Manke succeeded in observing a solid-state battery during charging and discharging and creating high-resolution 3D images. This showed that ...

Nanomaterial from the Middle Ages

Unlocking the secrets of Zwischgold

12-Oct-2022 - To gild sculptures in the late Middle Ages, artists often applied ultra-thin gold foil supported by a silver base layer. For the first time, scientists at the Paul Scherrer Institute PSI have managed to produce nanoscale 3D images of this material, known as Zwischgold. The pictures show this was ...

Seeing more deeply into nanomaterials

New 3D imaging tool reveals engineered and self-assembled nanoparticle lattices with highest resolution yet

21-Apr-2022 - From designing new biomaterials to novel photonic devices, new materials built through a process called bottom-up nanofabrication, or self-assembly, are opening up pathways to new technologies with properties tuned at the nanoscale. However, to fully unlock the potential of these new materials, ...

Advances in micro-computed tomography

Improved imaging for medicine and material sciences

10-Mar-2022 - Researchers in biomedical physics and biology have significantly improved micro-computed tomography, more specifically imaging with phase contrast and high brilliance x-ray radiation. They have developed a new microstructured optical grating and combined it with new analytical algorithms. The new ...

New world record in materials research - X-ray microscopy with 1000 tomograms per second

"This method opens a door for the non-destructive study of fast processes in materials, which is what many research groups and also industry have been waiting for"

29-Sep-2021 - Tomoscopy is an imaging method in which three-dimensional images of the inside of materials are calculated in rapid succession. Now a team led by HZB physicist Francisco García Moreno has achieved a new world record at the TOMCAT beamline of the Swiss Light Source at the Paul Scherrer Institute: ...

How catalysts age

"Our new, detailed results could help industrial companies optimise their catalysts and make them more durable"

11-Jun-2021 - PSI researchers have developed a new tomography method with which they can measure chemical properties inside catalyst materials in 3D extremely precisely and faster than before. The application is equally important for science and industry. The material group of vanadium phosphorus oxides (VPOs) ...

Making data matter

A multimaterial, voxel-printing method turns imaging datasets into physical objects

13-Jun-2018 - The world is awash in digital images, from photographs to x-rays to computer models to 3D scans. The advent of 3D printing has made it possible to take imaging data and print it into physical representations, but the process of doing so has been prohibitively time-intensive and costly. A new data ...

Quick and reliable 3-D imaging of curvilinear nanostructures

08-Sep-2017 - Physical and biological sciences increasingly require the ability to observe nano-sized objects. This can be accomplished with transmission electron microscopy (TEM), which is generally limited to 2D images. Using TEM to reconstruct 3D images instead usually requires tilting the sample through an ...