Dr. Eng. Armand Béché – CEO/CTO
With an engineering background in material science, Armand obtained later a PhD in physics on the development of TEM techniques for the measurement of strain at the nanometer scale. This experience allowed him to join FEI as a research scientist specialized in high end TEM techniques (Cs correction, monochromated EELS, holography, DPC…). After a few years in the TEM industry, he came back to the academic world as postdoctoral researcher in the EMAT, University of Antwerp, in the group of Jo Verbeeck. Continuing his research in quantitative field measurement, he also developed different manners to produce electron vortices in a TEM. His research later drifted to the study and implementation of compressed sensing techniques to record STEM images under lower electron dose. This strong experimental and physics background in the field of electron microscopy proved to be the suitable ingredients to start developing electron phase plates, first as a concept and now as a product for the electron microscopy community.
Prof. Dr. Eng. Jo Verbeeck – Scientific Advisor
Jo Verbeeck, initially trained as electronics engineer changed careers into experimental physics with a PhD. In the EMAT group of the university of Antwerp where he is currently full professor in physics, his work focuses on transmission electron microscopy applied to materials science and consist of a mix of materials characterisation research and technique development. Recent developments include coincidence detection between EELS and EDX spectroscopic events, event based readout in 4DSTEM, compressed sensing setups, novel scan strategies for beam damage mitigation, and wave shaping of electron beams. He has been leading the effort to take beam shaping of electron waves from single hero experiments towards a versatile tool for adaptive optics in electron microscopy. He will act as a scientific advisor in AdaptEM to make sure this groundbreaking technology can become beneficial to the widest range of users and applications by taking it out of the research domain into a range of innovative products.