Synchrotron Radiation X-ray Microscopy Based on Zone Plate Optics

The paper reviews some recent achievements of synchrotron radiation x-ray microscopy based on zone plate optics. The principle of full-field and scanning x-ray microscopes, the present state-of-art and the expected developments in the optics and instrumentation are presented and discussed. The potential of the x-ray microscopy for characterisation of laterally heterogeneous materials is illustrated using selected results obtained with the scanning photoelectron microscope at ELETTRA and the full-field imaging microscope at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF).