  Recently it was demonstrated (Schattschneider et al., Nature 441 (2006),
486), that an analogue of the X-ray magnetic circular dichroism (XMCD)
experiment can be performed with the transmission electron microscope (TEM).
The new phenomenon has been named energy-loss magnetic chiral dichroism (EMCD).
In this work we present a detailed ab initio study of the chiral dichroism in
the Fe, Co and Ni transition elements. We discuss the methods used for the
simulations together with the validity and accuracy of the treatment, which
can, in principle, apply to any given crystalline specimen. The dependence of
the dichroic signal on the sample thickness, accuracy of the detector position
and the size of convergence and collection angles is calculated.
