Fabrication of High Performance X-Ray Energy Analyzers

Crystal analyzers produced by spherically bending a Si crystal wafer are employed in high‐resolution inelastic x‐ray scattering experiments to increase the counting efficiency. The fabrication commonly involves dicing the crystal wafer into blocks of ∼1mm×1mm to release the bending strain before gluing the wafer onto a spherical substrate. During the gluing, the relative alignment of each block must be maintained to achieve the desired focusing effect. A novel pressing tool has been designed to apply uniform pressure on the wafer during the gluing process to ensure the relative alignment between the crystal blocks, and has produced analyzers with satisfactory performance. The design details and the fabrication process will be presented and discussed.