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Very High-Resolution Solar X-Ray Imaging Using Diffractive Optics

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Abstract

This paper describes the development of X-ray diffractive optics for imaging solar flares with better than 0.1 arcsec angular resolution. X-ray images with this resolution of the ≥ 10 MK plasma in solar active regions and solar flares would allow the cross-sectional area of magnetic loops to be resolved and the coronal flare energy release region itself to be probed. The objective of this work is to obtain X-ray images in the iron-line complex at 6.7 keV observed during solar flares with an angular resolution as fine as 0.1 arcsec – over an order of magnitude finer than is now possible. This line emission is from highly ionized iron atoms, primarily Fe xxv, in the hottest flare plasma at temperatures in excess of ≈ 10 MK. It provides information on the flare morphology, the iron abundance, and the distribution of the hot plasma. Studying how this plasma is heated to such high temperatures in such short times during solar flares is of critical importance in understanding these powerful transient events, one of the major objectives of solar physics. We describe the design, fabrication, and testing of phase zone plate X-ray lenses with focal lengths of ≈ 100 m at these energies that would be capable of achieving these objectives. We show how such lenses could be included on a two-spacecraft formation-flying mission with the lenses on the spacecraft closest to the Sun and an X-ray imaging array on the second spacecraft in the focal plane ≈ 100 m away. High-resolution X-ray images could be obtained when the two spacecraft are aligned with the region of interest on the Sun. Requirements and constraints for the control of the two spacecraft are discussed together with the overall feasibility of such a formation-flying mission.

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Acknowledgements

We thank John Krizmanic and Keith Gendreau for supporting the lens design and testing effort, Kenneth Phillips for providing the spectra shown in Figure 1 and for help with the solar objectives, and Amil Patel, Gang Hu, and Thitima Suwannasiri for their work fabricating the lenses in Goddard’s Detector Development Lab. This project was supported with funding from the Goddard Internal Research and Development (IRAD) program. CHIANTI is a collaborative project involving George Mason University, the University of Michigan (USA), and the University of Cambridge (UK).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Code 671, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, 20771, USA

    B. R. Dennis & A. Y. Shih

  2. Code 661, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, 20771, USA

    G. K. Skinner

  3. CRESST and Univ of Maryland, College Park, USA

    G. K. Skinner

  4. Code 553, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, 20771, USA

    M. J. Li

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  1. B. R. Dennis
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  2. G. K. Skinner
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  4. A. Y. Shih
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Correspondence to B. R. Dennis.

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Dennis, B.R., Skinner, G.K., Li, M.J. et al. Very High-Resolution Solar X-Ray Imaging Using Diffractive Optics. Sol Phys 279, 573–588 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11207-012-0016-7

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