Rizvi Aoon, Mulvey Justin T, Carpenter Brooke P, Talosig Rain, Patterson Joseph P
Department of Chemistry, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, California 92697-2025, United States.
Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, California 92697-2025, United States.
Chem Rev. 2021 Nov 24;121(22):14232-14280. doi: 10.1021/acs.chemrev.1c00189. Epub 2021 Jul 30.
Molecular self-assembly is pervasive in the formation of living and synthetic materials. Knowledge gained from research into the principles of molecular self-assembly drives innovation in the biological, chemical, and materials sciences. Self-assembly processes span a wide range of temporal and spatial domains and are often unintuitive and complex. Studying such complex processes requires an arsenal of analytical and computational tools. Within this arsenal, the transmission electron microscope stands out for its unique ability to visualize and quantify self-assembly structures and processes. This review describes the contribution that the transmission electron microscope has made to the field of molecular self-assembly. An emphasis is placed on which TEM methods are applicable to different structures and processes and how TEM can be used in combination with other experimental or computational methods. Finally, we provide an outlook on the current challenges to, and opportunities for, increasing the impact that the transmission electron microscope can have on molecular self-assembly.
分子自组装在生物和合成材料的形成过程中普遍存在。对分子自组装原理的研究所得知识推动了生物、化学和材料科学领域的创新。自组装过程跨越广泛的时间和空间范围，且往往直观性不足且复杂。研究此类复杂过程需要一系列分析和计算工具。在这些工具中，透射电子显微镜因其独特的可视化和量化自组装结构及过程的能力而脱颖而出。本综述描述了透射电子显微镜对分子自组装领域所做贡献。重点介绍了哪些透射电镜方法适用于不同结构和过程，以及透射电镜如何与其他实验或计算方法结合使用。最后，我们展望了当前在增强透射电子显微镜对分子自组装影响方面所面临的挑战和机遇。
