High-resolution x-ray scatter and reflectivity study of sputtered IR surfaces

In recent years there has been an increased interest in the possible use of Ir as the reflecting surface in X-ray telescope programs. An X-ray study of such surfaces produced by sputtering of Ir on highly polished Zerodur flats is presented here. The study was performed using Fe K(alpha) 1 (6.404 Kev) and Cu K(alpha) 1 (8.048 keV) and includes measurement of total external reflection and scattering. The scattering measurement was made with three different instruments arrangements; one employed a 1D position sensitive detector for low resolution studies giving approximately 30 arcsec resolution (FWHM), and the other two arrangements employed channel cut crystals providing resolutions (FWHM) of 5 arcsec and 1 arcsec, respectively at Cu K(alpha) 1. The reflectivity study revealed a very close correspondence with a theoretical model based on recently published optical constants. This important result shows that an Ir coating can be produced with nominal bulk density.