PHOTON SCIENCE

The imaging beamline (IBL) is dedicated to micro- and nanotomography at energies between 5 keV and 50 keV. The flexible design of the experimental stations allows for the investigation of samples with diameters ranging seamlessly from 100µm up to 10 mm with adequately adjusted resolution for each field of view. Phase contrast imaging methods like inline phase contrast and grating based phase contrast are available besides regular absorbtion contrast imaging.

The development of new materials highly demands the study of their three dimensional inner structures. Thus, in particular tomographic evaluation methods gain more and more importance in the materials characterization field. Characteristic length scales, which influence the structural properties, are often in the range of some micrometers down to a few nanometers.
Due to the extraordinary high brilliance of the storage ring PETRA III, the extremely low emittance and the high fraction of coherent photons even in the hard X-ray range an extremely intense and sharply focused X-ray light is provided.
These unique beam characteristics promote novel applications of tomographic techniques enabling ultra-fast in-situ measurements as well as highest spatial and density resolution. Additionally the highly coherent beam enables the application of phase contrast methods in an exceptional way.

Therefore, the Helmholtz-Zentrum Hereon is operating the Imaging BeamLine (IBL). This beamline is dedicated to full field micro and nano tomography and both end stations are optimized for in situ applications.
To provide optimized setups for a broad range structural length scales, the Imaging Beamline IBL is equipped with two tomographic endstations, the micro [1] and the nano [2] tomography endstation. The energy range at the IBL is tunable between 5 and 50 keV. The overall length of the Imaging Beamline is 87.5 m. For tomographic measurements at higher energies up to 150 keV an additional micro tomography setup at the HEMS beamline is available.