High Sensitivity EBSD Detectors

Electron Backscatter Diffraction (EBSD) detectors have evolved with the introduction of CMOS technology, ensuring faster and more sensitive analysis. However, what is meant by sensitivity? 

Sensitivity is related to the full-system efficiency, or Detective Quantum Efficiency (DQE).  Typically, in traditional CCD-based EBSD detectors this DQE is very low, however the use of fibre-optics in the Symmetry® CMOS-based EBSD detector allows for very high sensitivity and DQE.

By downloading this technical note you will learn:

• A definition of what we mean by the term ‘sensitivity’ for an EBSD detector
• How sensitivity is related to the full-system efficiency (the Detective Quantum Efficiency, or DQE)
• Summary of the limitations of conventional EBSD detectors
• Comparison of the sensitivities (DQEs) of different EBSD detectorsThe advantages of fibre optics
• that the DQE is very low for conventional detector designs (which use lens-based optics and CCD image sensors) but with the use of fibre-optics (and a large-area CMOS sensor) our Symmetry® EBSD detector achieve very high sensitivity, approaching that of the ideal detector.

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