Abstract: A method of autotuning an electron microscope by producing a series of images of the object to be examined, using a defined tilt of the electron beam in a different direction for each respective image. The images are thereby displaced relative to one another. Each image is then decomposed into a linear and a non-linear component thereof, and the linear image components are separated by Fourier filtering. The relative displacements of a number of the linear image components relative to each other are measured, and the measured displacement values are combined to derive autotuning parameters for the electron microscope.

Abstract: A high-resolution electron microscope (1) comprising a detection system (11), an image processing system (13) and an effective electron source (3) ensuring a comparatively small thermal energy spread of the electrons to be emitted is suitable for executing a method for directly deriving amplitude and phase information of an object (17) in the form of an electron wave function .phi.. To this end, a number of images of an object (17) are recorded by means of a high-resolution electron microscope (1) in image planes (19) with defocus values which differ only slightly. Thus, a substantially continuous series of images is formed as a function of the defocus value, resulting in a substantially three-dimensional image area. A quasi-three-dimensional Fourier transformation is performed thereon in order to separate linear and non-linear image information for the reconstruction of the electron wave function.