In-situ HRTEM Studies of Alumina-Aluminum Solid-Liquid Interfaces

The alumina-aluminum solid-liquid interfaces were directly observed at atomic scale by heating the alumina single crystal in high-voltage electron microscope (HVEM) owing to the electron beam damage processes, Atomic ordering in the first several layers of the liquid was clearly resolved adjacent to the alumina surface and its relevance to the single crystal growth was examined with the real-time observations.