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Abstract: When trying to measure an optical surface at utmost absolute precision, the problem of the missing or unknown “reference surface” is often encountered. It is obvious with Fizeau and Michelson's interferometry, where the height difference between the surface under test (SUT) and a reference surface is measured. It is also true from slope measurements in long trace profilers (LTP), where due to small construction errors, the response to a perfectly flat ideal surface can be considered as an unknown reference to be subtracted from the measurement data. As no “perfect artifact” can exist, these references cannot be directly determined. The addition of the unknown reference can severely bias the reconstructed surface when field stitching is applied. The results of ptychography have proved that when a measurement is a function of a unique object function with a translated but unique response function, the redundancy of a large set of data allows accurate reconstructions of the object and response function despite the presence of measurement noise. In the case of LTP and interferometry, the basic problem is linear and can be solved by linear algebra rather than iteratively. The method has been already applied to SOLEIL and ESRF LTPs and is succesfully used on a regular base. We show here that the method can be also applied to interferometry and improve stitching results. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Unknown linearity errors of long trace profilers (LTP) are a troublesome source of measurement errors and discrepancies from instrument to instrument, especially on strongly curved surfaces. This article describes a complete procedure of LTP data acquisition and data processing, which allow to, simultaneously, evaluate the linearity error and reconstruct a corrected slope profile. The method has been tested by performing independent measurements of the same mirrors on SOLEIL and ESRF LTP. Results show that independent measurements using this procedure are in agreement down to 0.2μrad RMS in slope and 1.6nm in height. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Characterizing nanofocusing X-ray mirrors for the soon coming nano-imaging beamlines of synchrotron light sources motivates the development of new instruments with improved performances. The sensitivity and accuracy goal is now fixed well under the nm level and, at the same time, the spatial frequency range of the measurement should be pushed toward 50mm−1. SOLEIL synchrotron facility has therefore undertaken to equip with an interferential microscope suitable for stitching interferometry at this performance level. In order to keep control on the whole metrology chain it was decided to build a custom instrument in partnership with two small optics companies EOTECH and MBO. The new instrument is a Michelson micro-interferometer equipped with a custom-designed telecentric objective. It achieves the large depth of focus suitable for performing reliable calibrations and measurements. The concept has been validated with a predevelopment set-up, delivered in July 2010, which showed a static repeatability below 1nm PV despite a non-thermally stabilized environment. The final instrument was delivered early this year and was installed inside SOLEIL's controlled environment facility, where thorough characterization tests are under way. Latest test results and first stitching measurements are presented. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

• The MPNSP instrument development is introduced including the objective, the hardware design, the theory, and the details in the alignment of the test mirror surface to the pitch rotation axis. • By detecting the rotation axis of the mirror pitch with a machine vision approach, we can determine and then reduce the vertical distance between the pitch rotation axis and the test mirror surface to a sub-mm level. • We describe a practical data acquisition procedure for strongly curved X-ray mirrors with a total slope range larger than the slope measuring range of the autocollimator used in the instrument. This opens a path to measure extreme off-axis elliptical mirrors with the MPNSP technique. We present our recent research and development effort on the Multi-Pitch Nano-accuracy Surface Profiler (MPNSP). This metrology instrument is developed to characterize strongly curved X-ray mirrors proposed to achieve diffraction-limited soft X-ray focusing for scientific applications at the synchrotron beamlines. The measurement process consists of forward-and-backward scans on the test mirror surface along its tangential direction at multiple pitch angles. Our research and development in this work aim to take the challenge of measuring strongly curved X-ray mirrors with a typical total slope range ≳ 10 mrad, while maintaining the Root Mean Square (RMS) value of measurement repeatability and self-consistency at 50 nrad RMS level. We first introduce the mechanical design, followed by a brief review of the mathematical model and the optimization algorithm for the MPNSP technique. By detecting the rotation axis of the mirror pitch with a machine vision approach, we can determine and then reduce the vertical distance between the pitch rotation axis and the test mirror surface to a sub-mm level. In addition, we describe a practical data acquisition procedure for strongly curved X-ray mirrors with a total slope range larger than the slope measuring range of the autocollimator used in the instrument. As a result, the proposed MPNSP measurements with different mirror orientations achieve remarkable self-consistency and reproducibility of < 50 nrad RMS in slope and < 0.5 nm RMS in height. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Nanoscopium 155 m-long beamline of Synchrotron Soleil is dedicated to scanning hard X-ray nanoprobe techniques. Nanoscopium aims to reach ≤100 nm resolution in the 5-20 keV energy range for routine user experiments. The beamline design tackles the tight stability requirements of such a scanning nanoprobe by creating an overfilled secondary source, implementing all horizontally reflecting main beamline optics, applying high mechanical stability equipment and constructing a dedicated high-stability building envelope. Multi-technique scanning imaging and tomography including X-ray fluorescence spectrometry and spectro-microscopy, absorption, differential phase and dark-field contrasts are implemented at the beamline in order to provide simultaneous information on the elemental distribution, speciation and sample morphology. This paper describes the optical concept and the first measured performance of the Nanoscopium beamline followed by the hierarchical length-scale multi-technique imaging experiments performed with dwell times down to 3 ms per pixel. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A soft x-ray spectrometer based on the use of an elliptical focusing mirror and a plane varied line spacing grating is described. It achieves both high resolution and high overall efficiency while remaining relatively compact. The instrument is dedicated to resonant inelastic x-ray scattering studies. We set out how this optical arrangement was judged best able to guarantee performance for the 50 -- 1000 eV range within achievable fabrication targets. The AERHA (adjustable energy resolution high acceptance) spectrometer operates with an effective angular acceptance between 100 and 250 µsr (energy dependent) and a resolving power well in excess of 5000 according to the Rayleigh criterion. The high angular acceptance is obtained by means of a collecting pre-mirror. Three scattering geometries are available to enable momentum dependent measurements with 135°, 90°, and 50° scattering angles. The instrument operates on the Synchrotron SOLEIL SEXTANTS beamline which serves as a high photon flux 2 x 200 µm² focal spot source with full polarization control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The new synchrotron-radiation circular-dichroism (SRCD) endstation on the UV-visible synchrotron beamline DISCO has been commissioned at the SOLEIL synchrotron. The design has been focused on preservation of a high degree of linear polarization at high flux and moderate resolving power covering the vacuum ultraviolet to visible spectral range (125-600 nm). The beam dimensions have been set to 4 mm × 4 mm at 1 nm bandwidth for lower sample degradation. The nitrogen-purged sample chamber fits three types of sample holders accommodating conventional round cell mounting, automated rotation of the samples, as well as a microfluidic set-up. Automated temperature-controlled data collection on microvolumes is now available to the biology and chemistry communities. Macromolecules including membrane proteins, soluble proteins, bio-nanotubes, sugars, DNA and RNAs are now routinely investigated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

DESIRS is a new undulator-based VUV beamline on the 2.75 GeV storage ring SOLEIL (France) optimized for gas-phase studies of molecular and electronic structures, reactivity and polarization-dependent photodynamics on model or actual systems encountered in the universe, atmosphere and biosphere. It is equipped with two dedicated endstations: a VUV Fourier-transform spectrometer (FTS) for ultra-high-resolution absorption spectroscopy (resolving power up to 106) and an electron/ion imaging coincidence spectrometer. The photon characteristics necessary to fulfill its scientific mission are: high flux in the 5-40 eV range, high spectral purity, high resolution, and variable and well calibrated polarizations. The photon source is a 10 m-long pure electromagnetic variable-polarization undulator producing light from the very near UV up to 40 eV on the fundamental emission with tailored elliptical polarization allowing fully calibrated quasi-perfect horizontal, vertical and circular polarizations, as measured with an in situ VUV polarimeter with absolute polarization rates close to unity, to be obtained at the sample location. The optical design includes a beam waist allowing the implementation of a gas filter to suppress the undulator high harmonics. This harmonic-free radiation can be steered toward the FTS for absorption experiments, or go through a highly efficient pre-focusing optical system, based on a toroidal mirror and a reflective corrector plate similar to a Schmidt plate. The synchrotron radiation then enters a 6.65 m Eagle off-plane normal-incidence monochromator equipped with four gratings with different groove densities, from 200 to 4300 lines mm−1, allowing the flux-to-resolution trade-off to be smoothly adjusted. The measured ultimate instrumental resolving powers are 124000 (174 µeV) around 21 eV and 250000 (54 µeV) around 13 eV, while the typical measured flux is in the 1010-1011 photons s−1 range in a 1/50000 bandwidth, and 1012-1013 photons s−1 in a 1/1000 bandwidth, which is very satisfactory although slightly below optical simulations. All of these features make DESIRS a state-of-the-art VUV beamline for spectroscopy and dichroism open to a broad scientific community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Numerical examples of time-dependent FEL wavefront propagation calculation and coherence analysis are presented. The calculations are performed using the Synchrotron Radiation Workshop (SRW)—wave-optics computer code optimized for synchrotron radiation, and the 3D FEL simulation code GENESIS 1.3. In the examples described, the electric field obtained at the exit of an FEL undulator after running GENESIS in time-dependent mode is transformed from time to frequency domain, and then propagated, using Fourier-optics methods implemented in SRW, through interferometer-type optical schemes. Time-averaged intensity patterns, obtained in image planes of the interferometers as a result of these simulations, allow for straightforward coherence characterization by visibility of interference fringes. The presented examples show that Fourier optics-based wavefront propagation method, as implemented in the SRW, can be effectively used for detailed analysis of characteristics of FEL radiation in time and in frequency domains. Besides, due to its high accuracy and CPU-efficiency, this method is very well suited for optimization of optical beamlines for fourth generation synchrotron radiation sources, for which accurate treatment of wave-optical phenomena, aimed to preserve radiation coherence and time structure, is of paramount importance. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

We have developed a setup for measuring holographically formed interference patterns using an integrated sample-mask design. The direct space image of the sample is obtained via a two-dimensional Fourier transform of the x-ray diffraction pattern. We present the details of our setup, commenting on the influence of geometrical parameters on the imaging capabilities. As an example, we present and discuss the results of test experiments on a patterned Co film. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article provides information on the characteristics of the Shack-Hartmann Wavefront Sensor. It optimized for working wavelengths and offers high performances with accuracy. The analysis of this sensor with a spatial resolution and at each point the local slopes are measured in both directions. An illustration of the Shack-Hartmann Wavefront Sensor has been presented.