Hard X-ray phase-contrast imaging with a microfocus source

Abstract

Since Röntgen’s discovery of X rays in 1895 the vast majority of radiographs have been collected and interpreted on the basis of absorption contrast and geometrical (ray) optics. In recent years the possibility of utilizing phase-contrast effects has received considerable attention, much of this activity stemming from the possibility of producing X-ray beams of suitably high coherence at synchrotron sources (1). A description of a phase-contrast imaging (PCI) technique which utilizes a laboratory-based microfocus X-ray source to achieve the required spatial coherence, and does not rely on there being a high degree of chromatic coherence, will be described (2). The method employs a relatively..