Abstract

We have developed and characterized a laser-plasma x-ray source as a useful laboratory size intense source for various applications such as soft x-ray lithography, x-ray microscopy for biological imaging (2 nm) (4 nm), material sciences, non-destructive testing for fine structures and so on. We have three kinds of laser systems for this purpose including a commercial YAG laser delivering 1 J energy with 8 ns pulse duration at 1 μm and 0.5 μm wavelengths, a zigzag slab laser delivering 4 J with 35 ns duration at 1 μm wavelength and a short pulse glass laser system having a chirped pulse amplification and a grating compression system¹ which can deliver 150 mJ with 1 ps duration at 1 μm wavelength and ~100 mJ with sub-ps duration at 0.5 μm wavelength as shown in Fig. 1. We can operate one of the systems to obtain the desired spectral region. In the target chamber, a rotating target and a tape target systems were installed to illuminate the target continuously. A grazing incidence and a transmission grating spectrometers were installed to measure the absolute soft x-ray spectral intensity ranging from 13 nm to 2 nm. A crystal spectrometer was also installed to measure the kilovolt x-ray spectra.

© 1995 IEEE