Bright, low debris, ultrashort hard x-ray table top source using carbon nanotubes

Abstract

We demonstrate that carbon nanotube coated surfaces produce two orders of magnitude brighter hard x-ray emission, in laser produced plasmas, than planar surfaces. It is accompanied by three orders of magnitude reduction in ion debris which is also low Z and nontoxic. The increased emission is a direct consequence of the enhancement in local fields and is via the simple and well known "lightning rod" effect. We propose that this carbon nanotube hard x-ray source is a simple, inexpensive, and high repetition rate hard x-ray point source for a variety of applications in imaging, lithography, microscopy, and material processing. © 2011 American Institute of Physics.