Eesmärk
LVEM5 has as good resolution as conventional TEM for material research LVEM5 is a new generation of electro-microcopy and it operates at low voltage of 5 KV instead of 80 KV for conventional TEM. The LVEM5 electron microscope is the only electron microscope with the technology to operate at 5 KV. The field emission gun (FEG) is Schottky type, which allows for strong interactions between electrons and the sample. The LVEM5 has almost as good resolution as the conventional TEM and SEM that we have in Turku.
LVEM5 greatly support biological and life scientific research In addition to material research, LVEM5 operates at 5 KV and it is especially powerful for analyzing biological samples. It can be used to better understand the molecular mechanisms of disease. The biology samples are normally a major challenge to image in conventional electron microscope as we have now in Turku, due to inherent low contrast provided by molecular composition. And the biology samples are easily burned at 80 KV. In the case of LVEM5, low energy electrons interact much more strongly with the sample than high energy electrons of classical TEM and the electrons are strongly scattered by organic materials resulting in exceptional differentiation of features. The low accelerating voltage in LVEM5 enables high contrast images with no addition of contrast-enhancing staining procedures, therefore it realizes the observation of the biological samples in their natural stage with minimal background noise. And for life scientists, getting high contrast images of the unstained biological samples is impossible with conventional TEM that we have in Turku.
The instrument will be placed in Biocity, Pharmaceutical Sciences Laboratory, Åbo Akademi University, where highly relays on TEM and SEM for nanomaterial characterisation. In addition, the instrument will also support the activities in Biology Science department, Åbo Akademi University and Turku Bioscience Center in Biocity for cell imaging. Due to the limited space in Biocity, only bench top version of TEM SEM can fit. In addition, the instrument will also be used for teaching due to the easy of hand on training and flexible in moving around.