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Updated: May 19, 2026

Synchrotron X-ray Microdiffraction and Fluorescence Imaging of Mineral and Rock Samples
Published on: June 19, 2018
Advantages of a synchrotron bending magnet as the sample illuminator for a wide-field X-ray microscope
1Xradia, 4385 Hopyard Road, Suite 100, Pleasanton, CA 94588, USA. mfeser@xradia.com
Abstract:
In this paper the choice between bending magnets and insertion devices as sample illuminators for a hard X-ray full-field microscope is investigated. An optimized bending-magnet beamline design is presented. Its imaging speed is very competitive with the performance of similar microscopes installed currently at insertion-device beamlines. The fact that imaging X-ray microscopes can accept a large phase space makes them very well suited to the output characteristics of bending magnets which are often a plentiful and paid-for resource. There exist opportunities at all synchrotron light sources to take advantage of this finding to build bending-magnet beamlines that are dedicated to transmission X-ray microscope facilities. It is expected that demand for such facilities will increase as three-dimensional tomography becomes routine and advanced techniques such as mosaic tomography and XANES tomography (taking three-dimensional tomograms at different energies to highlight elemental and chemical differences) become more widespread.
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