[en] The current year has been one of major advances in our progress towards the development of techniques for the study of surfaces with high spatial resolution. The medium-energy (1-15keV) REMEDIE system (for Reflection Electron Microscopy and Electron Diffraction at Intermediate Energies) has been rebuilt to the stage of showing better than 100A in the transmission mode in good vacuum and has been applied to the study of some surface reconstructions on silicon. These instruments include a 300 keV TEM-STEM analytical electron microscopy from Philips, to be converted for operation under ultra-high vacuum conditions by GATAN Inc. In this a resolution of better than 2.3A and various microanalytical techniques will be applied to surface studies. Also an ultra-high vacuum dedicated STEM instrument is being obtained and this will be modified for the combined application of high resolution STEM imaging, microdiffraction and microanalysis and the surface research techniques of AES, SAM, LEED, UPS and so on. Further observations on the interactions of small metal particles with ceramics have revealed a situation which has profound implications for electron-optical studies and for some possible technical applications of ceramic systems. It has been shown that the surface of MgO is modified by the presence of small amounts of various metals in such a way that it becomes highly sensitive to electron irradiation, undergoing vigorous reconstructions of the surface morphology and in some cases, becoming amorphous