Wolter-I-like X-ray telescope structure using one conical mirror and one quadric mirror

TL;DR

This paper proposes a novel Wolter-I-like X-ray telescope design using a combination of conical and quadric mirrors to improve angular resolution while reducing manufacturing complexity.

Contribution

It introduces a new mirror configuration replacing one of the traditional Wolter-I mirrors with a conical shape, maintaining imaging quality and optimizing telescope length.

Findings

Cone-hyperboloid structure offers the best angular resolution.

The cone-hyperboloid design is shorter than the paraboloid-cone at the same focal length.

Nested configurations improve on-axis and off-axis imaging performance.

Abstract

Nested multilayer mirrors are commonly used in X-ray telescope structures to increase the collecting area. To balance the difficulty and cost of producing these mirrors, the classical Wolter-I structure has previously been replaced with a conical Wolter-I structure, but it can lead to significantly poorer angular resolution. In this paper, we consider changing one of the mirror shapes (paraboloid or hyperboloid) of the Wolter-I structure to a conical mirror shape, while the other mirror shape remains a quadric surface-type structure, which could thus ensure the imaging quality. Based on a theoretical analysis and the results of simulations, the cone-hyperboloid and paraboloid-cone structures are found to provide the best angular resolutions, and the cone-hyperboloid structure is shorter than the paraboloid-cone structure at the focal length. The cone-hyperboloid structure is then nested to obtain the best on-axis angular resolution and off-axis images.