One-minute nano-tomography using hard X-ray full-field transmission microscope

Full field transmission X-ray microscopy (TXM) is a powerful technique for non-destructive 3D imaging with nanometer-scale spatial resolution. However, to date, the typical acquisition time with the hard X-ray TXM at a synchrotron facility is >10 min for a 3D nano-tomography dataset with sub-50 nm spatial resolution. This is a significant limit on the types of 3D dynamics that can be investigated using this technique. Here, we present a demonstration of one-minute nano-tomography with sub-50 nm spatial resolution. This achievement is made possible with an in-house designed and commissioned TXM instrument at the Full-field X-ray Imaging beamline at the National Synchrotron Light Source-II at Brookhaven National Laboratory. This capability represents an order of magnitude decrease in the time required for studying sample dynamics with 10 s of nm spatial resolution.