A comparison of molecular dynamics potentials used to account for thermal diffuse scattering in multislice simulations

Here we investigate electron scattering simulations with thermal displacements incorporated using molecular dynamics potentials. Specifically, we explore the sensitivity of electron scattering to the phonon band structure, or more explicitly interatomic forces. Silicon serves as the model material where we introduce thermal atomic displacements via empirical and machine-learned molecular dynamics interatomic potentials and compare them to finite-temperature density functional theory interatomic forces. We demonstrate that when molecular dynamics potentials do not sufficiently reproduce the correct phonon band structure, significant errors in the simulated diffraction and image intensities can occur. Moreover, for Si, we find that multislice simulations using machine-learned interatomic potentials are more accurate than empirical ones. In addition to the selected atomic potential, we demonstrate that the sensitivity to the phonon band structure also depends on the crystal zone axis, which can be used to enhance sensitivity to thermal displacements. Finally, we provide a sensitivity analysis with angle-resolved scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM) to enhance image sensitivity to the details of the phonon band structure.