Free Electron Laser (FELs) as well as storage-ring-based photon sources have seen an enormous improvement over the past decade regarding stability, brilliance and availability of coherence. To give today`s photon science a benefit from these unique source properties the availability of optical elements of utmost quality is essential. However, their supply is very limited because due to the lack of sufficient manufacturing capacity at companies as well as at laboratories world-wide. Only a few companies are technological skilled to supply mirror or grating substrates of sub-nm quality regarding figure- and finish-error on a sufficient length of aperture. Even more critical is the situation for diffractive optical elements such as gratings or reflection zone plates. Especially gratings of blazed groove-profile are provided by very few manufacturers only with extremely long delivery time and high risk of failure during manufacturing. In this presentation we will report on the current state of quality achieved for different type of X-ray-optical elements like mirrors of different size and geometry as well as gratings, of laminar or blazed groove profile. Further consideration will be given to new developments on the production of blazed gratings like new ruling machines to provide gratings of significant larger aperture size as well as the option to obtain blazed gratings by means of e-beam lithography. In addition we report on the methods to verify their quality by means of ex-situ and at-wave-length metrology during manufacturing and for final acceptance test at facility side.
Optical constants of materials are essential for predicting and interpreting optical responses, which is crucial when designing new optical components. Although accurate databases of optical constants are available for some regions of the electromagnetic spectrum, for the vacuum ultraviolet (VUV), the extreme ultraviolet (EUV), and soft x-ray spectral ranges, the available optical data suffer inconsistencies, and their determination is particularly challenging. Here, we present a selected example of ruthenium (Ru) for the determination of optical constants from the VUV to the soft x-ray spectral range using reflectivity measurements performed with synchrotron radiation. The subtleties of reflectivity measurements are discussed for a large wavelength range, from 0.7 to 200 nanometers.
The PolFEL free electron laser, currently under construction at the National Centre for Nuclear Research in Poland, will generate a beam of coherent electromagnetic radiation in the ultraviolet (UV) spectral range with a wavelength of about 150 nm to 300 nm, in the form of several hundred fs pulses, energy up to 50 μJ, and repetition rate of 50 kHz. Vacuum ultraviolet (VUV) radiation beam in the wavelength range from 50 nm to 100 nm will be obtained by selecting the third harmonic using an absorption filter. The optical system of the UV/VUV beamline consists of two plane M1 and M2 mirrors and one focusing ellipsoidal M3 mirror. The radiation produced in the laser hits on the M1 mirror at a grazing incidence angle of 5°. After reflection from the M1 mirror, the beam falls on the M2 mirror at an angle of 17°, which directs the beam to the ellipsoidal M3 mirror, focusing the beam at the image plane at the second focal point of the ellipsoid. The M1 mirror is placed behind the 3 m-thick concrete wall in a hutch separated from the experimental hall by a 1.6 m-thick concrete wall. The optical properties of the beamline were tested by ray-tracing simulations using the RAY-UI software, the results of which are presented in the paper.
A laboratory-based reflectometer designed for characterizing the reflectivity of optical coatings in 30- to 200-nm wavelength range was recently developed at IPOE. An RF-produced gas-discharge light source is applied to generate characteristic lines. The light source is mounted on a grazing incident monochromator with a 146-deg deviation angle between the incident and diffracted arms. By precisely adjusting the toroidal grating inside the monochromator chamber, monochromatic lights are acquired through the exit slit. A collimator mirror and two sets of collimation slits with 2 mm × 2 mm dimension are utilized for reducing the divergence of the beam incident on the sample. A high-precision six-axis translation stage, which allows a heavy sample with a maximum diameter of 100 mm, is used to control positions of the samples and the detector. A chopper disk used both for incident light intensity monitor and signal modulation is placed with an incidence angle of 70 deg relative to the incident light beam. The configuration, adjustment process, and test results of the reflectometer are presented in detail. The experimental reflectivity results for Al / LiF / MgF2 film obtained from our laboratory and BESSY-II Synchrotron as well as Hefei Synchrotron Light Source are given and compared for demonstrating the reliability of the system.
A state-of-the-art compact Low-Energy X-ray Reflectometer is in operation at DTU Space and is used to characterize x-ray coatings for the optics of future spaceborne and ground-based telescopes. The reflectometer is housed in a vacuum chamber and operates at 1.487 keV, complimenting an existing 8.048 keV reflectometer. With a microfocus source and plane-parabolic Kirkpatrick–Baez mirrors, the 0.5-mm wide beam is collimated to <0.75 arcmin. An actively cooled 2D CCD yields sample alignment precision of 26 μm in linear position and 0.18 arcmin in angle. A multilayer monochromator provides a peak reflectance of 43.5% and beam purity > 99 % . The reflectometer has a 2θ range of 0 deg to 35 deg and dynamic range up to eight orders of magnitude. Techniques are demonstrated to investigate the sample surface morphology and we show the system’s capability to detect the presence of atmospheric contaminants on coated mirrors.
Mo/Be multilayers are promising optical elements for extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography and space optics. Experimentally derived optical constants are necessary for accurate and reliable design of beryllium-containing optical coatings. We report optical constants of beryllium derived from synchrotron radiation-based reflectivity data of Mo/Be multilayers. Results are in good agreement with available data in the literature obtained from the well-known absorption measurements of beryllium thin films or foils. We demonstrate synchrotron based at-wavelength reflectometry as an accurate and non-destructive technique for deriving EUV optical constants for materials that are difficult or unstable to make thin foils for absorption measurements.
Effective area is one of the most important parameters of x-ray telescopes. It can be increased by enlarging the entrance aperture or maximizing the reflectivity through the proper designing and optimization of the reflecting coating. A method to increase the reflectivity of grazing incidence x-ray mirrors in the 0.5- to 8-keV energy region is analyzed. The idea consists in the use of a trilayer reflecting coating instead of single-layer one (e.g., C/Ni/Pt mirror instead of Pt one). Deposition of low-absorbing medium-Z and low-Z layers onto the top of strongly absorbing high-Z material results in essential increase in the reflectivity while keeping the same width of the reflectivity plateau. In particular, C/Ni/Pt trilayer mirror demonstrates enhancement of the double reflection coefficient by a factor achieving 1.5 to 3.5 compared to that of Pt-coated mirror. The effective area of a telescope is also considerably increased. The experimental results are in a very good agreement with the theoretical predictions. In addition, the C/Ni/Pt trilayer mirror exhibits a reasonable thermal stability and a relatively low compressive stress of about −550 MPa.
The low efficiency of conventional single layer gratings at the tender X-ray region (E=1~5 keV) significantly limits the photon flux of the beamline and the development of related imaging and spectroscopy experiments in this region. To overcome this issue, multilayer coated gratings have been proposed and developed. The diffraction behavior of a multilayer grating is more complex than a single layer grating. To understand the diffraction behavior and exert the maximum potential of this new optics, we have built an analytical theory based on coupled wave theory. A high efficiency single order diffraction regime was first identified which means only one diffraction order will be excited with a certain incidence angle and structure parameters. This is applicable to blazed multilayer gratings (BMGs). To achieve maximum efficiency, the optimum grating and multilayer structures were analyzed. The highest theoretical efficiency of a BMG can reach the same value of the coated multilayer reflectance. Moreover, blazed multilayer gratings exhibit the advantage of high harmonics suppression. For the BMG, the conventional condition of maximal diffraction efficiency, Dsinα = nd, where D and d is the grating period and multilayer period, respectively, α is blaze angle, n is diffraction order, has been proved invalid. This is due to the contribution of anti-blaze facets to diffraction and effect of strongly asymmetric diffraction. Based on these, a Cr/C BMG was fabricated in collaboration with the Department for Nanometer Optics and Technology in BESSY-II. Maximum efficiency of up to 60% was demonstrated at 3 keV which is close to the theoretical prediction.
The contamination of optical elements (mirrors and gratings) with carbon still is an issue when using soft x-ray synchrotron radiation. With an in-house developed HF-plasma treatment we are able to decontaminate our optics in-situ from carbon very efficiently. The cleaning device, a simple Al-antenna, is mounted in situ inside the mirror- and grating vacuum chambers. A systematic study of the HF-plasma cleaning efficiency was performed acquired with in-situ and exsitu methods for monitoring: An atomic force microscope (AFM) and a scanning tunneling microscope (STM) were used before and after the cleaning process to determine the surface morphology and roughness. Reflectivity angular scans using the reflectometer at the BESSY-II Metrology Station [1-3] allowed to estimate the thickness of the remaining Clayer after different cleaning steps and thereby helped us to determine the etching rate. Reflection spectra measurements in the range of 200 eV – 900 eV show the complete removal of Carbon from the optics without contaminating it with any other elements due to the plasma treatment. The data show that the plasma process improves the reflectivity and reduces the roughness of the surface. In addition to that, the region of the optical surface where the carbon has been removed becomes passivated.
Within our technology center for production of highly efficient precision gratings a versatile 4-circle UHV-reflectometer
for synchrotron radiation based at-wavelength characterization has been fabricated. The main feature is the possibility to
incorporate real live-sized gratings. The samples are adjustable within six degrees of freedom by a novel UHV-tripod
system, and the reflectivity can be measured at all incidence angles for both s- and p-polarization geometry. The
reflectometer has been setup in a clean room hutch and it is coupled permanently to the optics beamline PM-1 for the UV
and XUV range with the polarization adjustable to either linear or elliptical. The setup will be open to users by the end of
2014.
The design for a new XUV-Optics Beamline is presented. The collimated plane grating monochromator (PGM-)
beamline at a bending magnet is setup at the BESSY-II synchrotron radiation facility within the framework of the
blazed-grating production facility. Coupled to a versatile four-circle (ten axes) UHV- reflectometer as a permanent end
station the whole setup is dedicated to at-wavelength characterization and calibration of the in-house produced precision
gratings and novel nano-optical devices as well as mirrors, multilayered systems etc. It is also open to external projects
employing reflectometry, spectroscopy or scattering techniques. According to its purpose, this beamline has specific
features, such as: very high spectral purity, provided by two independent high order suppression systems, an advanced
aperture system for suppression of stray light and scattered radiation, a broad energy range between 10 eV and 2000 eV,
small beam divergence and spot size on the sample. Thus this Optics Beamline will become a powerful metrology tool
for reflectivity measurements in s- or p-polarisation geometry with linearly or elliptically polarized light on real optics up
to 360 mm length and 4 kg weight.
Access to the requested content is limited to institutions that have purchased or subscribe to SPIE eBooks.
You are receiving this notice because your organization may not have SPIE eBooks access.*
*Shibboleth/Open Athens users─please
sign in
to access your institution's subscriptions.
To obtain this item, you may purchase the complete book in print or electronic format on
SPIE.org.
INSTITUTIONAL Select your institution to access the SPIE Digital Library.
PERSONAL Sign in with your SPIE account to access your personal subscriptions or to use specific features such as save to my library, sign up for alerts, save searches, etc.