Cryogenic transmission electron microscopy (TEM) has revolutionised our understanding of biological materials at the atomic scale. Despite the research breakthroughs in biology, utilising cryogenic conditions for TEM research of heterogeneous materials is still in its infancy. The main advantages of cryogenic TEM for energy materials lie in two aspects. First, it reduces damage from electron irradiation for beam sensitive materials, such as superionics, soft matter, and materials involving liquid phases. Second, temperature control of TEM holders well below room temperature allows for researchers to explore in-situ how complex exotic phenomena occur that only exist at cryogenic temperatures in quantum materials. New theoretical and data analysis techniques including artificial intelligence/machine learning approaches are critical for cryogenic TEM to overcome low signal/noise and instrumentation stability constraints that can be common to cryo-EM experiments. This symposium focuses on recent advances and emerging developments in the area of cryogenic TEM, including cryo-FIB based sample preparation and vitrification, which are expected to open a new platform to probe phenomena in quantum and energy materials that have not been accessible before.

electron energy loss spectroscopy (EELS) energy storage focused ion beam (FIB) in situ machine learning operando quantum effects quantum sensing scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM) transmission electron microscopy (TEM)