Nano-precision metrology of X-ray mirrors

Synchrotrons work like a giant microscope, and they both need mirrors and lenses to bend and shape light. The better control we have over the light source, the more we can see. The quality of images that can be captured using a microscope or a synchrotron rely heavily on the optics used.

As technology has advanced over the past few decades and as synchrotron users push the boundaries of what can be achieved, there has been a lot of excitement over the upgrades of synchrotron mirrors and what that can mean for the experiments that can be done.

However, there is a bottleneck for the production of new and improved X-ray optics like mirrors. It turns out that it is hard to develop metrology instruments that can validate and measure the quality of new high-precision mirrors. Producing these instruments and alleviating the bottleneck is the goal of the metrology community, as they say, if you cannot test something, you cannot manufacture it.

Using the properties of speckle to get better measurements

The metrology community has made significant advances by making improvements to existing techniques to test X-ray mirrors. However, a team from Diamond set about creating a brand-new instrument which can potentially improve the toolbox for metrologists and manufacturers around the world.

Read more on the Diamond website

Image: Dr Hongchang Wang (Left) is supervising his PhD student Simone Moriconi (Right) for testing SAM system

Tiny Chip-Based Device Performs Ultrafast Manipulation of X-Rays

Researchers from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Photon Source (APS) and Center for Nanoscale Materials at Argonne National Laboratory have developed and demonstrated new x-ray optics that can be used to harness extremely fast pulses in a package that is significantly smaller and lighter than conventional devices used to manipulate x-rays. The new optics are based on microscopic chip-based devices known as microelectromechanical systems (MEMS).

“Our new ultrafast optics-on-a-chip is poised to enable x-ray research and applications that could have a broad impact on understanding fast-evolving chemical, material and biological processes,” said research team leader Jin Wang from the X-ray Science Division Time Resolved Research (TRR) Group at the APS. “This could aid in the development of more efficient solar cells and batteries, advanced computer storage materials and devices, and more effective drugs for fighting diseases.”

In new results published in The Optical Society OSA) journal Optics Express, the researchers demonstrated their new x-ray optics-on-a-chip device (Fig. 1), which measures about 250 micrometers and weighs just 3 micrograms, using the TRR Group’s 7-ID-C x-ray beamline at the APS. The tiny device performed 100 to 1,000 times faster than conventional x-ray optics, which that tend to be bulky.

Read more on the APS website

Image: Fig. 1. The photograph shows two MEMS elements on a single chip (A), with the active elements of 250 µm × 250 µm, and the micrograph (B) highlighting the size of the diffractive element, as compared to a section of human hair (C).