Nanoscale three-dimensional structural analysis of polymeric materials by transmission electron microtomography

This article summarizes recent advances in emerging three-dimensional (3D) imaging techniques and their applications to polymer-related materials such as nanocomposites and block copolymer morphologies. We place particular emphasis on the method of transmission electron microtomography (TEMT). As a result of some recent developments in TEMT, it is now possible to obtain truly quantitative 3D data with sub-nanometer resolution. A wide range of new structural information, which cannot be obtained from conventional microscopy or various scattering methods, can be evaluated directly from the 3D volume data. Here, as an example of the use of TEMT in the nanostructural analysis of polymers, we reveal the epitaxial relation during the order-order transition from gyroid to cylindrical microdomains using TEMT. (author)