Effective Multimodal Multiscale Analytical and Imaging Correlation

Microstructure impacts material properties such as wear resistance, ductility, toughness, conductivity, and permeability. Notably, no single microscope can examine microstructure at all length scales and with all modes of data acquisition. In these cases, multimodal multiscale microscopy integrates results from multiple devices into cohesive understanding. Three cases present hardware and software to merge image or spectral data collected by different microscopes and detectors to achieve new insights: 1) microcomputed tomography and scanning electron microscopy of a porous rock core, 2) plasma focused ion beam and energy-dispersive spectroscopy (EDS) of a shale matrix, and 3) correlative light and electron microscopy in a cryo environment. In each case, thoughtful experimental designs, integrated sample holders, accessible file formats, online software, and offline postprocessing permitted integrated investigation of microstructure in heterogeneous samples.