W.C. Lenthe, M.P. Echlin, A. Trenkle, M. Syha, P. Gumbsch, T.M. Pollock

Journal of Applied Crystallography, 48, (2015)

Recently, techniques for the acquisition of three-dimensional tomographic and four-dimensional time-resolved data sets have emerged, allowing for the analysis of mm³ volumes of material with nm-scale resolution. The ability to merge multi-modal data sets acquired via multiple techniques for the quantitative analysis of structure, chemistry and phase information is still a significant challenge. Large three-dimensional data sets have been acquired by time-resolved diffraction contrast tomography (DCT) and a new TriBeam tomography technique with high spatial resolution to address grain growth in strontium titanate. A methodology for combining three-dimensional tomographic data has been developed. Algorithms for the alignment of orientation reference frames, unification of sampling grids and automated grain matching have been integrated, and the resulting merged data set permits the simultaneous analysis of all tomographic data on a voxel-by-voxel and grain-by-grain basis. Quantitative analysis of merged data sets collected using DCT and TriBeam tomography shows that the spatial resolution of the DCT technique is limited near grain boundaries and the sample edge, resolving grains down to 10 µm diameter for the reconstruction method used. While the TriBeam technique allows for higher-resolution analysis of boundary plane location, it is a destructive tomography approach and can only be employed at the conclusion of a four-dimensional experiment.