amplitude-phase diagram

In the case of the description of the propagation of a diffracted electron wave, let us plot the value of the wave function in the complex plane with coordinates x₀, y₀. The length of the line drawn from the origin to the point (x₀, y₀) expresses the amplitude, and the angle between the line and the horizontal axis expresses the phase of the wave. The diagram is called the "amplitude-phase diagram." When a crystal is divided into many layers in its thickness direction, the amplitude and phase of the diffracted wave in each layer is successively added until the bottom surface. The resultant intensity of the wave at the bottom surface is obtained as the square of the length of the line drawn from the origin to the final point (x, y) at the bottom surface. In 1960s, Hirsch et al., for the first time, revealed the image contrast of dislocations and stacking faults using the amplitude-phase diagram.

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