Approaching quantitative Zernike phase contrast in full-field transmission hard X-ray microscopy: Origin and reduction of artifacts

Abstract

Zernike phase contrast in hard X-ray transmission microscopy provides in-line observation of phase enhanced imaging of weak-absorbing objects. However, the inherent artifacts are the major hurdle to acquire quantitative structural analysis, and may even present misleading information. We explore the origin of these artifacts by frequency analysis in Fourier domain. Subsequently, a simple and flexible method for artifacts reduction well-suited for full-field transmission hard X-ray microscopy based on combination of spectra is proposed. It is demonstrated to yield quantitative local phase maps, with the characteristic artifact patterns reduced.