The emerging field of 3D electron diffraction (3D ED) opens new opportunities for structure determination from sub-micrometre-sized crystals. Although the foundations of this technology emerged earlier, the past decade has seen developments in cryo-electron microscopy and (X-ray) crystallography that particularly enable the widespread use of 3D ED. This Perspective describes to chemists and chemical crystallographers just how similar electron and X-ray diffraction are and discusses their complementary aspects. We wish to establish 3D ED in the broader chemistry community, such that electron crystallography becomes a common part of the analytical chemistry toolkit. With a suitable instrument at their disposal, every skilled crystallographer can quickly learn to perform structure determinations using 3D ED.

新兴的 3D 电子衍射 (3D ED) 领域为亚微米级晶体的结构测定开辟了新的机会。尽管这项技术的基础出现得较早，但在过去十年中，冷冻电子显微镜和（X 射线）晶体学的发展尤其促进了 3D ED 的广泛使用。该观点向化学家和化学晶体学家描述了电子和 X 射线衍射的相似之处，并讨论了它们的互补方面。我们希望在更广泛的化学界建立 3D ED，从而使电子晶体学成为分析化学工具包的常见部分。有了合适的仪器，每位熟练的晶体学家都可以快速学会使用 3D ED 进行结构测定。