Water is an essential constituent of all biological materials as well as many non-biological materials. Not only the removal of water may result in undesirable morphological and structure change, the inability to sustain the hydrated conditions in the microscope also prevents the study of reactions which take place in aqueous environment. In order to overcome these problems we used wet environmental-cell transmission electron microscopy TEM (WETEM). Conventional TEM of dry smectite showed well-defined particle outlines (but without a specific shape) and typical smectite aggregates. Selected area electron diffraction (SAD) of dry particles showed stacking of smectite particles (i.e., aggregate) in very clear dot and ring patterns. In contrast, WETEM depicted well-dispersed clay particles showing a variety of different particle shapes. Analysis of SAD patterns obtained from dry and hydrated states illustrated a lattice change in different environments. The small lattice expansion in (h k 0) resulted from the expansion of the (0 0 l) plane resulting from the addition of water molecules in the crystal along the c-axis.

水是所有生物材料以及许多非生物材料的重要组成部分。除去水不仅会导致不良的形态和结构变化，而且无法在显微镜下维持水合条件也妨碍了研究在水性环境中发生的反应。为了克服这些问题，我们使用了湿式环境电池透射电子显微镜TEM（WETEM）。干蒙脱石的常规TEM显示出轮廓分明的颗粒轮廓（但没有特定形状）和典型的蒙脱石聚集体。干燥颗粒的选定区域电子衍射（SAD）显示蒙脱石颗粒（即聚集体）以非常清晰的点和环图案堆积。相反，WETEM描绘了分散良好的粘土颗粒，显示出各种不同的颗粒形状。从干燥和水合状态获得的SAD模式分析表明，在不同环境中晶格发生了变化。（hk 0）的小晶格膨胀是由于（0 0 l）平面的膨胀，这是由于在晶体中沿c轴添​​加了水分子所致。