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One activity has centred on the use of coated, silicon wafers, patterned with ribs, that are integrated onto a mandrel whose form has been polished to the required shape. The wafers follow the shape precisely, forming pore sizes in the sub-mm region. Individual stacks of mirrors can be manufactured without risk to, or dependency on, each other and aligned in a structure from which they can also be removed without hazard. A breadboard is currently being built to demonstrate this technology.
A second activity centres on glass pore optics. However an adaptation of micro channel plate technology to form square pores has resulted in a monolithic material that can be slumped into an optic form. Alignment and coating of two such plates produces an x-ray focusing optic. A breadboard 20cm aperture optic is currently being built.
Silicon Pore Optics are made of commercial Si wafers using process technology adapted from the semiconductor industry. We present the manufacturing process ranging from single mirror plates towards complete focusing mirror modules mounted in flight configuration. The performance of the mirror modules is tested using X-ray pencil beams or full X-ray illumination. In 2009, an angular resolution of 9 arcsec was achieved, demonstrating the improvement of the technology compared to 17 arcsec in 2007. Further development activities of Silicon Pore Optics concentrate on ruggedizing the mounting system and performing environmental tests, integrating baffles into the mirror modules and assessing the mass production.
Cosine has developed the technology to bend and directly bond Si mirror plates in order to produce stiff, lightweight Xray optics which are used for large area space based X-ray telescopes. This technology, Silicon Pore Optics (SPO), also allows us to produce other types of high energy optics. Here we present the latest developments in the design and manufacture of a new generation of soft gamma-ray Laue lenses made using SPO technology named Silicon Laue lens Components: SiLC.
The bending and bonding of 300 μm thin Si single crystals allows us to fabricate a single crystal with radially curved crystal planes, which strongly improves the focusing properties of a Laue lens. The size of the focal spot is no longer determined by the size of the individual single crystals, but by the accuracy of the applied curvature, which is as low as a few seconds of arc. Furthermore, a wedge is incorporated in each individual Si crystal to ensure that all crystals are confocal in the radial direction. A secondary curvature in the axial direction can be used to improve the reflectivity of each crystal, and increase the reflected energy bandwidth.
We present the first SiLC crystals which will be manufactured in the fall of 2013. These are technology demonstrators designed for 125 keV radiation, 3.4m focal length and 600mm2 frontal area. The first measurements at synchrotron radiation facilities are planned for November 2013. With these first prototype lenses we want to demonstrate that the SPO stacking technology can be successfully applied to non-ribbed Si wafer plates and subsequently demonstrate the correct focusing in Laue geometry of both the wedges and radial curvature.
Silicon Pore Optics is an enabling technology for future L- and M-class astrophysics X-ray missions, which require high angular resolution (~5 arc seconds) and large effective area (1 to 2 m2 at a few keV). The technology exploits the high-quality of super-polished 300 mm silicon wafers and the associated industrial mass production processes, which are readily available in the semiconductor industry. The plan-parallel wafers have a surface roughness better than 0.1 nm rms and are diced, structured, wedged, coated, bent and stacked to form modular Silicon Pore Optics, which can be grouped into a larger optic. The modules are assembled from silicon alone, with all the mechanical advantages, and form an intrinsically stiff pore structure.
The optics design was initially based on long (25 to 50 m) focal length X-ray telescopes, which could achieve several arc second angular resolution by curving the silicon mirror in only one direction (conical approximation).
Recently shorter focal length missions (10 to 20 m) have been discussed, for which we started to develop Silicon Pore Optics having a secondary curvature in the mirror, allowing the production of Wolter-I type optics, which are on axis aberration-free.
In this paper we will present the new manufacturing process, the results achieved and the lessons learned.
Keywords: XMM, X-ray astronomy, Wolter I telescope, grazing incidence optics
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