Zonal Placement Errors in Zone Plate Lenses

Diffractive zone plate lenses are critical elements in extreme ultraviolet and soft x-ray applications that require optical imaging or light concentration. To achieve good optical performance, the zone plate features must be accurately defined over the sizable area of the zone plate. Here the effects of zone placement fabrication errors on the performance of zone plates are investigated. Experimentally observed zone-plate diffraction patterns are compared to calculated profiles for different zone placement error models to estimate the magnitude of zonal placement errors.