Understanding how liquid crystal domains shift during heating is critical to the development of organic electronics. In a recent study, researchers used the Direct Electron Celeritas XS to do in situ 4D STEM and capture dynamic, high-resolution maps of local crystal orientation in real time. Thanks to Celeritas XS’s unmatched speed and sensitivity, they were able to visualize domain reorganization under heat as it happened, providing new insight into the underlying mechanisms.

Nanoscale View of Alignment and Domain Growth in a Hexagonal Columnar Liquid Crystal,
S. Huang et al. ACS Nano, 18, (41), 28095–28103 (2024)

Read the abstract here: https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/acsnano.4c07507