Visualization of lithium ions by annular bright field imaging

The detection of lithium ions is required for characterization of lithium ion batteries, since the movement of lithium ions in the battery is one of the key ways to improve the performance. Annular bright field (ABF) imaging enables us to visualize individual lithium atomic columns simultaneously with heavy elements. Furthermore, it has been found that the number of lithium ions at the column is countable when the specimen is thin. These results suggest that movement of lithium ions in the material can be observed by taking consecutive ABF images during operation or in situ ABF observation. Actually, the spinel structure of L2V4O crystals was directly observed to be transformed into the defective NaCl structure at the moment when lithium ions were extracted from the original position during electron beam irradiation. We clarify the features of ABF imaging by comparing it with HAADF imaging in order to understand what information can be obtained by ABF imaging directly.