We conduct electrically driven atomic diffusion reactions for in situ fabrication of different structures inside a TEM. The direction of atomic diffusion can be controlled by the electrical field, while the diffusion path can be tailored by local temperature, resulting in distinct heterostructures.
We image the etching of gold nanorods directly at the solid-liquid-gas interface through liquid cell transmission electron microscopy. The local reaction is dramatically accelerated by up to 20 times when the distance between the gas bubbles and the solid (nanorods) is less than 1 nm.