An X-ray interferometer comprises a plane film of material of low X-ray absorption coefficient, a first surface facing one side of the film, and a second surface facing the other side of the film and substantially opposite the first surface, the first and second surfaces being of high X-ray absorption coefficient and being relatively inclined at a small angle, arranged so that when a beam of X-rays is incident on the film at a glancing angle in the plane in which the small angle of relative inclination lies, a first part of the incident beam is, in sequence, transmitted by the film, reflected by the first surface, and reflected by the film as a first partial beam, and a second part of the incident beam is, in sequence, reflected by the film, reflected by the second surface, and transmitted by the film as a second partial beam which intersects the first partial beam.
An x-ray reflecting system comprising a Kirkpatrick-Baez side-by-side optic in a single corner configuration having multi-layer Bragg x-ray reflective surfaces.
A phase-contrast X-ray imaging system according to the present invention comprises an X-ray interferometer, wherein X-ray interfering beams thicker than 2 cm.times.2 cm are formed enabling observation of comparatively large objects. The X-ray interferometer is constituted by two crystal blocks which each are monolithically cut out from ingots of crystal and have two wafers which function as X-ray half mirrors. An optical equipment, a chamber, and a feedback system are incorporated to adjust and stabilize the crystal blocks. A device is also incorporated to obtain an image showing the distribution of the X-ray phase shift with which diagnosis become easier and reliable.
An x-ray beam conditioning system with a first diffractive element and a second diffractive element. The two diffractive elements are arranged in a sequential configuration, and one of the diffractive elements is a crystal. The other diffractive element may be a multilayer optic.
The present invention provides an x-ray beam conditioning system with a Kirkpatrick-Baez diffractive optic including two optical elements, of which one of the optical elements is a crystal. The elements are arranged in a side-by-side configuration. The crystal can be a perfect crystal. One or both diffractive elements can be mosaic crystals. One element can be a multilayer optic. For example, the multilayer optic can be an elliptical mirror or a parabolic mirror with graded d-spacing. The graded d-spacing can be either lateral grading or depth grading, or both.
