Explainer video: “Coherent Diffractive Imaging with Diffractive Optics” (PhysRevLett 223901, 2022)
Channel: sci.photos
Date: 2022-06-12

Step-by-step animation explaining our new X-ray imaging method:
https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.128.223901
https://www.uni-goettingen.de/en/3240.html?id=6700
https://twitter.com/uniGoettingen/status/1534080207883276288

The scientists used a lens consisting of finely structured layers of a few atomic layers deposited from concentric rings on a thin wire. The lens, with a diameter of less than one fiftieth of a millimetre, was then adjusted between the object to be imaged and an X-ray camera in the extremely bright and focussed X-ray beam at the German Electron Synchrotron (DESY) in Hamburg. On the camera, the researchers received three different types of signal that together provided complete information about the structure of the unknown object, even if the objects absorbed little or no X-ray radiation. All that remained was to find a suitable algorithm to decode the information and reconstruct it into a sharp image. For this solution to work, it was crucial to precisely measure the lens itself, which was far from perfect, and to completely dispense with the assumption that it could be ideal. In their first application, the researchers investigated semiconductor nanowires, which are of particular interest as new materials for photovoltaics for instance.