A variety of tools are currently available for use in nanotechnology. These generally fall into two broad categories: imaging techniques and chemical/elemental identification techniques. Imaging techniques include the Transmission Electron Microscope (TEM) and the Atomic Force Microscope (AFM). Identification techniques include Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry (SIMS), X-ray Fluorescence (XRF), and Auger Electron Spectroscopy (AES). The Imago LEAP^® complements the most widely used techniques, i.e. the TEM, SIMS, and AFM.

The TEM can be used on a wide range of materials and has good spatial resolution. Tomography and spectroscopy techniques have been added to enable it to provide three-dimensional and chemical information. These developments come at a cost: atomic resolution is lost because the information it provides is rendered by averaging data from a 20nm thick, two-dimensional specimen. SIMS provides ease of specimen preparation and excellent mass sensitivity - up to parts per billion. Even so, it cannot resolve less than ~10 atoms in the direction of analysis, and not less than ~100 atoms perpendicular to the direction of analysis.

Three-dimensional atom probes (3DAP) provide both atom-scale resolution and compositional analysis, and are able to image and identify individual atoms in a single analysis.