X-Ray Telescopes

Optical Engineering Seminar Presentation

Submitted by:
K.Sai Krishna Teja
B160336EP
Outline:
1. Introduction
2. X-Ray Telescopes: Working and Principle
3. Optics of X-ray Telescope: Focussing
4. Detection
1. Introduction
• The study of astronomical objects at the highest energies of X-rays
and gamma rays began in the early 1960s.
• Before then, scientists knew that the Sun was an intense source in
these wavebands but had not observed other objects in the X-ray.
• Earth's atmosphere absorbs most X-rays and gamma rays, so rocket
flights that could lift scientific payloads above Earth's atmosphere
were needed.
• Several types of astrophysical objects emit, fluoresce, or reflect X-
rays, from galaxy clusters, through black holes in active galactic nuclei
(AGN) to galactic objects such as supernova remnants, stars, and
binary stars containing a white dwarf (cataclysmic variable stars and
super soft X-ray sources), neutron star or black hole (X-ray binaries).
• Some solar system bodies emit X-rays, the most notable being the
Moon, although most of the X-ray brightness of the Moon arises from
reflected solar X-rays.
• A combination of many unresolved X-ray sources is thought to
produce the observed X-ray background.

• The X-ray continuum can arise from bremsstrahlung, black-body

radiation, synchrotron radiation, or what is called inverse Compton
scattering of lower-energy photons by relativistic electrons, knock-on
collisions of fast protons with atomic electrons, and atomic
recombination, with or without additional electron transitions.

• The first rocket flight to successfully detect a cosmic source of X-ray

emission was launched in 1962 by a group at American Science and
Engineering (AS&E), including scientists Riccardo Giacconi, Herb
Gursky, Frank Paolini, and Bruno Rossi. This rocket flight used a
small X-ray detector, which found a very bright source they named
Scorpius X-1. (So-named because it was the first X-ray source found
that appeared in the sky in the constellation Scorpius).
2. X-Ray Telescopes: Working and Principle

• X-ray telescope, instrument designed to detect and resolve X-rays

from sources outside Earth’s atmosphere.
• Because of atmospheric absorption, X-ray telescopes must be carried
to high altitudes by rockets or balloons or placed in orbit outside the
atmosphere.
• Balloon-borne telescopes can detect the more penetrating (harder) X-
rays, whereas those carried aloft by rockets or in satellites are used to
detect softer radiation.
• The design of this type of telescope must be radically different from
that of a conventional optical telescope. Since X-ray photons have so
much energy, they would pass right through the mirror of a standard
reflector. X-rays must be bounced off a mirror at a very low angle if
they are to be captured. This technique is referred to as grazing
incidence. For this reason, the mirrors in X-ray telescopes are
mounted with their surfaces only slightly off a parallel line with the
incoming X-rays. Application of the grazing-incidence principle
makes it possible to focus X-rays from a cosmic object into an image
that can be recorded electronically
3. Optics of X-ray Telescopes: Focussing

• The utilization of X-ray mirrors allows to focus the incident radiation

on the detector plane.
• Different geometries (e.g. Kirkpartick-Baez or Lobster-eye) have been
suggested or employed, but almost the totality of existing telescopes
employs some variation of the Wolter I design.
• The limitations of this type of X-ray optics result in much narrower
fields of view (typically <1 degree) than visible or UV telescopes.
• The mirrors can be made of ceramic or metal foil coated with a thin
layer of a reflective material (typically gold or iridium). Mirrors based
on this construction work on the basis of total reflection of light at
grazing incidence.
4. Detection
• X-rays span 3 decades in wavelength (~8 nm - 8 pm), frequency (~50
PHz - 50 EHz) and energy (~0.12 - 120 keV). In terms of temperature,
1 eV = 11,604 K. Thus X-rays (0.12 to 120 keV) correspond to 1.39 ×
106 to 1.39 × 109 K. From 10 to 0.1 nanometers (nm) (about 0.12 to
12 keV) they are classified as soft X-rays, and from 0.1 nm to 0.01 nm
(about 12 to 120 keV) as hard X-rays. Few of the detectors used in X-
ray Astronomy are:
a. Charge coupled Devices
b. Proportional Counters
c. Scintillation detectors
a. Charge coupled devices (CCD)

• Most existing X-ray telescopes use CCD detectors, similar to those in

visible-light cameras. In visible-light, a single photon can produce a
single electron of charge in a pixel, and an image is built up by
accumulating many such charges from many photons during the
exposure time.
• When an X-ray photon hits a CCD, it produces enough charge
(hundreds to thousands of electrons, proportional to its energy) that the
individual X-rays have their energies measured on read-out.
b. Proportional Counters

• A proportional counter is a type of gaseous ionization detector that

counts particles of ionizing radiation and measures their energy. It
works on the same principle as the Geiger-Müller counter, but uses a
lower operating voltage.
• All X-ray proportional counters consist of a windowed gas cell.Often
this cell is subdivided into a number of low- and high-electric field
regions by some arrangement of electrodes.
c. Scintillation Detectors

• A scintillator is a material which exhibits the property of luminescence

when excited by ionizing radiation. Luminescent materials, when
struck by an incoming particle, such as an X-ray photon, absorb its
energy and scintillate, i.e. reemit the absorbed energy in the form of a
small flash of light, typically in the visible range.

Other detectors used are

• Modulation collimator
• X-ray Spectrometer
Thank You