A diffraction-limited Wolter nested-shell telescope concept with pico-radian resolution

Abstract

We present a novel nested-shell Wolter x-ray telescope design that can achieve diffraction-limited performance over the entire telescope aperture. The new design features a compact single-spacecraft mirror assembly, similar in form to that proposed for Lynx, and a separate detector spacecraft. A wide range of design parameter space was considered. We present a specific example which features 10 micro-arcsec resolution, a wide band (0.1-10 keV) with > 2 m2 effective area out to 10 keV, a large flat field (>1010 pixels), achieving diffraction-limited performance (Strehl ratio > 0.8). We will also briefly discuss a potential science case for this telescope.