EBSD has advanced dramatically in recent years, benefiting from advances in detector performance (both acquisition speed and sensitivity), band detection and indexing algorithms; notably ‘refined accuracy’ and ‘TKD mode’.

Refined accuracy as method has been developed to improve the angular (and positional) accuracy of the band detection and subsequent indexing, using a conventional 2D Hough transformation, without having to incur unacceptable computational time penalties. This has been achieved by developing a refinement method: initially obtaining an orientation measurement from the raw band detection and then applying the predicted band centres and widths from the indexing to the experimental band detection.

Disparity is detected and acted upon in a reiterative process, using the band positions and widths defined by the solution to check the validity of those detected experimentally. In this manner unreliable band detection which may result from broad or curved bands and those falling near the margins of the Hough detection, which may otherwise serve to reduce the angular accuracy of the indexing, are compensated for. Using this method the angular accuracy can be significantly enhanced.

The method has significant advantages both for EBSD and notably Transmission Kikuchi Diffraction (TKD) which is frequently subject to far greater gnomic distortion. TKD mode effectively compensates for this extreme situation, allowing the use of conventional EBSD detector without modification.

 
The talk introduces these advances in angular accuracy, plus detector developments which permit unprecedented rates of data acquisition.