The Imaging Properties of the Gas Pixel Detector as a Focal Plane Polarimeter

Fabiani, Sergio; Costa, E.; Monte, E. Del; Muleri, Fabio; Soffitta, P.; Rubini, A.; Bellazzini, R.; Brez, A.; Ruvo, Luca de; Minuti, M.; Pinchera, Michele; Sgrò, C.; Spandre, G.; Spiga, D.; Tagliaferri, G.; Pareschi, G.; Basso, S.; Citterio, O.; Burwitz, V.; Burkert, Wolfgang; Menz, Benedikt; Hartner, Gisela

doi:10.1088/0067-0049/212/2/25

Cited by 33 publications

(26 citation statements)

References 63 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…The imaging capabilities of the detector were measured either in laboratory with a narrow pencil beam 17 and at the PANTER X-ray test facility. 18 We disentangled the various components concurring to the overall angular resolution confirming the expectation 19 that the main contribution is provided by the performances of the optics. The second contribution for importance is given by the inclined penetration of the photons in the 1-cm thick drift region, due to the narrow incidence optics, while the intrinsic position resolution of the detector provides a negligible contribution.…”

Section: The Detector Capabilitysupporting

confidence: 72%

XIPE: the X-ray imaging polarimetry explorer

et al. 2013

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

XIPE, the X-ray Imaging Polarimetry Explorer, is a mission dedicated to X-ray Astronomy. At the time of writing XIPE is in a competitive phase A as fourth medium size mission of ESA (M4). It promises to reopen the polarimetry window in high energy Astrophysics after more than 4 decades thanks to a detector that efficiently exploits the photoelectric effect and to X-ray optics with large effective area. XIPE uniqueness is time-spectrallyspatially-resolved X-ray polarimetry as a breakthrough in high energy astrophysics and fundamental physics. Indeed the payload consists of three Gas Pixel Detectors at the focus of three X-ray optics with a total effective area larger than one XMM mirror but with a low weight. The payload is compatible with the fairing of the Vega launcher. XIPE is designed as an observatory for X-ray astronomers with 75 % of the time dedicated to a Guest Observer competitive program and it is organized as a consortium across Europe with main contributions from

show abstract

Section: The Detector Capabilitysupporting

confidence: 72%

XIPE: the X-ray imaging polarimetry explorer

et al. 2013

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…While this is not expected to affect the PSF characterization of grazing-incidence mirrors (which reflectivity is fairly independent of the polarization state), it can be useful to perform X-ray polarimetry experiments. [12] Silicon cannot efficiently diffract 1.49 keV X-rays. For the setup corresponding to this energy, it should be replaced by ADP (101) -Ammonium Dihydrogen Phosphate, NH 4 H 2 PO 4 (5.32 Å d-spacing, corresponding to a 51.46 deg Bragg angle).…”

Section: Optical Component Descriptionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Design and advancement status of the Beam Expander Testing X-ray facility (BEaTriX)

et al. 2016

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The BEaTriX (Beam Expander Testing X-ray facility) project is an X-ray apparatus under construction at INAF/OAB to generate a broad (200´60 mm 2 ), uniform and low-divergent X-ray beam within a small lab (6´15 m 2 ). BEaTriX will consist of an X-ray source in the focus a grazing incidence paraboloidal mirror to obtain a parallel beam, followed by a crystal monochromation system and by an asymmetrically-cut diffracting crystal to perform the beam expansion to the desired size. Once completed, BEaTriX will be used to directly perform the quality control of focusing modules of large X-ray optics such as those for the ATHENA X-ray observatory, based on either Silicon Pore Optics (baseline) or Slumped Glass Optics (alternative), and will thereby enable a direct quality control of angular resolution and effective area on a number of mirror modules in a short time, in full X-ray illumination and without being affected by the finite distance of the X-ray source. However, since the individual mirror modules for ATHENA will have an optical quality of 3-4 arcsec HEW or better, BEaTriX is required to produce a broad beam with divergence below 1-2 arcsec, and sufficient flux to quickly characterize the PSF of the module without being significantly affected by statistical uncertainties. Therefore, the optical components of BEaTriX have to be selected and/or manufactured with excellent optical properties in order to guarantee the final performance of the system. In this paper we report the final design of the facility and a detailed performance simulation.

show abstract

“…The use of a polarized beam does not affect the PSF and the effective area of the XOU, because in grazing incidence the reflectivity is almost exactly same for both polarization states, but it provides the additional opportunity to test X-ray polarimetric systems. 16…”

Section: Symmetric Crystalsmentioning

confidence: 99%

BEaTriX, expanded x-ray beam facility for testing modular elements of telescope optics: an update

et al. 2015

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

We present in this paper an update on the design of BEaTriX (Beam Expander Testing X-ray facility), an X-ray apparatus to be realized at INAF/OAB and that will generate an expanded, uniform and parallel beam of soft X-rays. BEaTriX will be used to perform the functional tests of X-ray focusing modules of large X-ray optics such as those for the ATHENA X-ray observatory, using the Silicon Pore Optics (SPO) as a baseline technology, and Slumped Glass Optics (SGO) as a possible alternative. Performing the tests in X-rays provides the advantage of an in-situ, at-wavelength quality control of the optical modules produced in series by the industry, performing a selection of the modules with the best angular resolution, and, in the case of SPOs, there is also the interesting possibility to align the parabolic and the hyperbolic stacks directly under X-rays, to minimize the aberrations. However, a parallel beam with divergence below 2 arcsec is necessary in order to measure mirror elements that are expected to reach an angular resolution of about 4 arcsec, since the ATHENA requirement for the entire telescope is 5 arcsec. Such a low divergence over the typical aperture of modular optics would require an X-ray source to be located in a several kilometers long vacuum tube. In contrast, BEaTriX will be compact enough (5 m x 14 m) to be housed in a small laboratory, will produce an expanded X-ray beam 60 mm x 200 mm broad, characterized by a very low divergence (1.5 arcsec HEW), strong polarization, high uniformity, and X-ray energy selectable between 1.5 keV and 4.5 keV. In this work we describe the BEaTriX layout and show a performance simulation for the X-ray energy of 4.5 keV.

show abstract

The Imaging Properties of the Gas Pixel Detector as a Focal Plane Polarimeter

Cited by 33 publications

References 63 publications

XIPE: the X-ray imaging polarimetry explorer

XIPE: the X-ray imaging polarimetry explorer

Design and advancement status of the Beam Expander Testing X-ray facility (BEaTriX)

BEaTriX, expanded x-ray beam facility for testing modular elements of telescope optics: an update

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About