World-leading microscopes take candid snapshots of atoms in their ‘neighborhoods’

For the first time, scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have shown how a powerful electron microscope can provide direct insight into the performance of any material by pinpointing specific atomic "neighborhoods." In particular, the scientists made molecular movies showing how the nanostructure of a semiconductor used in organic solar cells changed in response to a common processing additive known to enhance solar cell efficiency.