Abstract
Lensless X-ray coherent diffraction imaging (CDI) has emerged as a thriving field promising applications in materials and biological sciences1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13 with a theoretical imaging resolution only limited by the X-ray wavelength. Most CDI methods use transmission geometry, which is not suitable for nanostructures grown on opaque substrates or for objects of interest comprising only surfaces or interfaces. Attempts have been made to perform CDI experiments in reflection geometry, both optically and with X-rays, but the reconstruction resulted in mostly planar images, with less success in the third dimension14,15. Here, we discuss the development of coherent surface scattering imaging in grazing-incidence geometry that takes advantage of enhanced X-ray surface scattering and interference near total external reflection. We demonstrate the successful reconstruction of substrate-supported non-periodic surface patterns in three dimensions with nanometre resolution in the direction normal to the substrate, promising wide applications in elucidating structures in substrate-supported and buried nanoelectronics and photonics.
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Acknowledgements
The authors thank X. Huang for constructive suggestions, and M. Guizar, S. Sinha, C. Jacobson, A. Sandy and S. Narayanan for valuable discussions. The authors also thank A. Khounsary for providing the ultraflat silicon substrate, and B. Liu, A. Yan, V. Dravid, J. Qian, L. Assoufid, R. Divan, D. Rosenmann, C. Liu and M. Wieczorek for their assistance with sample fabrication and characterization. R. Bradford, T. Lutes and M. Rivers are thanked for their cooperation with detector usage. Use of the Advanced Photon Source and the Center for Nanoscale Materials were supported by the US Department of Energy Office of Science (contract no. DE-AC02-06CH11357).
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J.W. conceived the project. T.S., Z.J. and J.W. designed the experiment and participated in data analysis. T.S., Z.J. and J.S. conducted the experiment. Samples were fabricated by T.S. and L.O. All authors discussed the results and contributed to writing the manuscript.
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Sun, T., Jiang, Z., Strzalka, J. et al. Three-dimensional coherent X-ray surface scattering imaging near total external reflection. Nature Photon 6, 586–590 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/nphoton.2012.178
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nphoton.2012.178
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