Using electron vortex beams to determine chirality of crystals in transmission electron microscopy

Chiral crystals come in left- and right-handed forms. Methods for using electron diffraction to determine crystal chirality have heretofore required the use of multiple scattering and depended sensitively on the sample thickness. Here it is shown that these constraints can be removed with the use of electron vortex beams (which carry orbital angular momentum) in a transmission electron microscope. In accordance with theoretical expectation, the chirality of a sample of Mn₂Sb₂O₇ is experimentally determined.