Discharge-based sources of XUV-X radiations: development and applications

There is an increasing use of high energy photons in many fields of research and in industry. Where large installations such as synchrotrons or dedicated laser based source facilities can provide solutions for specific needs, they are presently unable to bring convenient solutions for on-site experiments or industrial processes. Compact discharge based devices appear to be a very interesting response to the demand in many cases. They can provide high photon fluxes in a wide spectral range, from VUV to hard x-rays, covering most of the actual needs. Certainly, they still need a lot of improvement and optimization to meet the most stringent requirements. In this paper, we will present some of the recent results we obtained in that field along with new applications. Among them, we will present our report on the performance of a novel and truly compact xenon-filled fast capillary discharge system which generates radiation mostly in the EUV region (10-16 nm) developed in the framework of an EUV lithography program. We will also present results obtained in the field of hard x-ray generation with a new source capable of producing high dose pulses in quasi-continuous or burst mode at a very high frequency developed for high speed cineradiography.