In events combining growth and etching, these observations do not necessarily happen simultaneously but may show different temporal offsets, as shown in Figure and Figure , as well as literature reports. This can be understood when taking a closer look at the system itself. Our kinetic simulations assume a perfectly isotropic voxel, excluding phase boundaries or concentration gradients. Thus, steady-state concentrations are reached within a fraction of a second and without any transient behaviors. However, concentration gradients and heterogeneous phase compositions are expected to delay this process, shifting it to observable time scales and causing transients. In other words: only surface atoms of a nanostructure can contribute to a chemical reaction, whereas interior atoms remain passive. Therefore, the system can be analyzed best at an experiment showing a slow response of the particles to mitigate the effect of steep overshoots or oscillations. Figure shows micrographs of the temporal evolution of a gold nanostructure in LP-TEM. The particle was present before electron irradiation and is thus regarded as a charge-dissipation product caused by the graphene membrane (see supplement, section S4 for details ). The nanostructure is exposed to repetitive beam contraction. Consequently, the dose rate is enhanced locally, altering the redox chemistry. By assuming a spherical geometry, the particle size can be tracked by a single parameter, describing the sphere's radius with a cross sectional area equivalent to the projected particle size. This equivalent radius is plotted in Figure .