Imaging optics and projection exposure apparatus for projection lithography with such imaging optics

An imaging optical system is used for imaging an object field in an image field. The imaging optical system has a pupil obskurierte (21). This pupil (21) has a center (Z) which is penetrated by a principal ray of a central field point. Furthermore, the imaging optical system has a plurality of imaging optical components. A center of gravity (SP) of a related pupil Obskurationsbereichs (18) of the imaging optical system is decentralized to the pupil (21) of the imaging optics. According to a further aspect, the imaging optical system is formed with a catoptric last mirror having a through-opening for the passage of imaging light. A the passage opening surrounds the edge region of a reflection surface of the last mirror is contiguous used for reflecting the image light. A penultimate in the imaging beam path mirror is closed, that is free of openings formed unused reflecting surface. The passage opening is arranged such that in this way a pupil Obskurationsbereich (18) is generated which is not centrally located in the pupil (21) of the imaging optics. With such imaging optical systems a well corrected field mappable results combined with high image light throughput.