HEAD 2000, November 2000
Session 43. Missions and Instruments
Display, Friday, November 10, 2000, 8:00am-6:00pm, Bora Bora Ballroom

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[43.30] X-ray optics made from thin plastic foils

H. W. Schnopper (Smithsonian Astrophysical Obs.), M. Barbera (Oss. Astro. di Palermo Giuseppe S. Vaiana), R. Ingram, E. Silver, S. Romaine, S. Bandler, S. Murray (Smithsonian Astrophysical Obs.), F. E. Christensen, A. Hussain (Danish Space Research Inst.), A. Collura (Oss. Astro. di Palermo Giuseppe S. Vaiana)

New design concepts and materials can be used to produce lightweight, thin foil approximations, to Wolter I and other X-ray optics. Structures are designed around a central hub and spacers that connect two (or three) spoked wheels. Figure defining, thin pins span the distance between the wheels. Thin, metal coated or multilayered, plastic foils can be formed into full cones, cylinders or spirals for X-ray telescopes or lenses.

High resolution X-ray scattering data were obtained for single foils at Cu K (8 KeV). Multi-energy (0.28 - 8 KeV) data were obtained with a multichannel plate imager in a 17 m beam line with a point-to-point focusing, cylindrical X-ray lens with 14 shells. The largest shell has a diameter of 175 mm and a length of 100 mm. Typical images have a FWHM of 20 arcsec. The results indicate that a 60 cm diameter, 4.65 m focal length X-ray telescope can have an HPD of considerably less than 2 arcmin.

This research is supported, in part by NASA Grant NAG5-5268, ONR Grant N00014-95-1-1248, and by institutional funding from the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory. The SAO multilayer facility receives support from NASA Grant NAG5-5095. This work made use of the MRSEC Shared Experimental Facilities at MIT supported by NSF Grant DMR94-00334.



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