SPARSE -- Efficient High-Resolution SEM Imaging of Rare Microstructural Features Across Large Areas by Selective Rescanning

Fuente: arXiv
Gespeichert in:
Bibliographische Detailangaben
Hauptverfasser: Reclik, Tom, Gerlach, Jan, Wollenweber, Maximilian A., Korkolis, Yannis P., Korte-Kerzel, Sandra, Kerzel, Ulrich
Format: Preprint
Veröffentlicht: 2026
Schlagworte:
Online-Zugang:
Tags: Tag hinzufügen
Keine Tags, Fügen Sie den ersten Tag hinzu!
_version_ 1866913066677960704
author Reclik, Tom
Gerlach, Jan
Wollenweber, Maximilian A.
Korkolis, Yannis P.
Korte-Kerzel, Sandra
Kerzel, Ulrich
author_facet Reclik, Tom
Gerlach, Jan
Wollenweber, Maximilian A.
Korkolis, Yannis P.
Korte-Kerzel, Sandra
Kerzel, Ulrich
contents Characterisation of rare microstructural features in scanning electron microscopy (SEM) requires imaging large areas at high resolution. This leads to prohibitively long acquisition times. We present an open-source Python framework that addresses this bottleneck through a two-stage approach: a fast scan identifies regions of interest, which are then selectively rescanned with imaging parameters suitable for quantitative analysis. The framework defines a generic microscope interface and a modular detection interface, allowing adaptation to different microscope platforms and detection methods. Scanning, detection, and rescanning are parallelized using separate processes, ensuring that computation time does not extend acquisition time. The two processes communicate exclusively through queues, avoiding shared mutable state and eliminating the need for explicit synchronization. We validate the framework on damage detection in dual-phase DP800 steel using a Tescan Clara SEM. For a representative configuration a detection rate of 99 % is achieved at approximately 58 % of the conventional acquisition time. At 95 % detection rate, acquisition time drops to 19 %. These time savings estimates represent lower bounds based on the ratio of scanned pixels. The complete implementation will be made available upon publication and upon request during peer-review.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2604_24769
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle SPARSE -- Efficient High-Resolution SEM Imaging of Rare Microstructural Features Across Large Areas by Selective Rescanning
Reclik, Tom
Gerlach, Jan
Wollenweber, Maximilian A.
Korkolis, Yannis P.
Korte-Kerzel, Sandra
Kerzel, Ulrich
Applied Physics
Materials Science
Instrumentation and Detectors
Characterisation of rare microstructural features in scanning electron microscopy (SEM) requires imaging large areas at high resolution. This leads to prohibitively long acquisition times. We present an open-source Python framework that addresses this bottleneck through a two-stage approach: a fast scan identifies regions of interest, which are then selectively rescanned with imaging parameters suitable for quantitative analysis. The framework defines a generic microscope interface and a modular detection interface, allowing adaptation to different microscope platforms and detection methods. Scanning, detection, and rescanning are parallelized using separate processes, ensuring that computation time does not extend acquisition time. The two processes communicate exclusively through queues, avoiding shared mutable state and eliminating the need for explicit synchronization. We validate the framework on damage detection in dual-phase DP800 steel using a Tescan Clara SEM. For a representative configuration a detection rate of 99 % is achieved at approximately 58 % of the conventional acquisition time. At 95 % detection rate, acquisition time drops to 19 %. These time savings estimates represent lower bounds based on the ratio of scanned pixels. The complete implementation will be made available upon publication and upon request during peer-review.
title SPARSE -- Efficient High-Resolution SEM Imaging of Rare Microstructural Features Across Large Areas by Selective Rescanning
topic Applied Physics
Materials Science
Instrumentation and Detectors
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2604.24769