Hard x-ray telescope to be onboard ASTRO-H

Abstract

The new Japanese X-ray Astronomy satellite, ASTRO-H will carry two identical hard X-ray telescopes (HXTs), which cover 5 to 80 keV. The HXT mirrors employ tightly-nested, conically-approximated thin-foil Wolter-I optics, and the mirror surfaces are coated with Pt/C depth-graded multilayers to enhance hard X-ray effective area by means of Bragg reflection. The HXT comprises foils 450 mm in diamter and 200 mm in length, with a focal length of 12 m. To obtain a large effective area, 213 aluminum foils 0.2 mm in thickness are tightly nested confocally. The effective area is expected to be ~ 310 cm² at 30 keV and the image quality to be ~1.′7 in half-power diameter.