High-resolution Laue-type DuMond curved crystal spectrometer

We report on a high-resolution transmission-type curved crystal spectrometer based on the modified DuMond slit geometry. The spectrometer was developed at the University of Fribourg for the study of photoinduced X-ray spectra. K and L X-ray transitions with energies above about 10 keV can be measured with an instrumental resolution comparable to their natural linewidths. Construction details and operational characteristics of the spectrometer are presented. The variation of the energy resolution as a function of the focal distance and diffraction order is discussed. The high sensitivity of the spectrometer is demonstrated via the 2s-1s dipole-forbidden X-ray transition of Gd which could be observed despite its extremely low intensity. The precision of the instrument is illustrated by comparing the sum of the energies of the Au K-L-2 and L-2-M-3 cascading transitions with the energy of the crossover K-M-3 transition as well as by considering the energy differences of the Gd K alpha(1) X-ray line measured at five different diffraction orders. Finally, to demonstrate the versatility of the spectrometer, it is shown that the latter can also be used for in-house extended X-ray absorption fine structure measurements. (C) 2013 AIP Publishing LLC.