Dear Colleagues,

Atom probe tomography (APT) belongs to a family of techniques under the umbrella term “atom probe microscopy”. APT has been traditionally used to study metals and metal alloys, although its applications now include geological and biological materials. It is a technique that is unique in its ability to experimentally resolve the real-space, 3D position, and chemical identity of each individual atom within a 100 × 100 × 500 nm³ volume (or 100 million atoms). Usually this is the “go-to” technique when other characterization methods (such as light optical microscopy, scanning electron microscopy, and transmission electron microscopy) have failed to determine the structural origin of a particular property, because the size scale of the phenomenon is too small. Important insights into the nanoscale structure of metal alloys, such as precipitates, grain boundaries, grain misorientation, solute clustering, and ordering, are all made possible with the information from APT.

In this Special Issue, we welcome contributions (original research articles or review articles) relating to the use of APT data in the study of metallic materials. The contribution could include new instrumentation or specimen preparation procedures enabling the study of metallic materials previously inaccessible by APT; a new analysis technique to interpret APT data; a new metallurgical or structure–property relationship insight gained from APT; or a study of previous literature to provide future directions for APT.

Dr. Anna Ceguerra
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

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Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Metals is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• atom probe tomography
• metallurgy
• microscopy
• nanoscale characterization