Grazing incidence small-angle X-ray scattering microtomography demonstrated on a self-ordered dried drop of nanoparticles.

We combine grazing-incidence small-angle X-ray scattering (GISAXS) with scanning X-ray microtomography to investigate the nanostructure in a dried gold/polystyrene nanocomposite drop. Local GISAXS structure factors are reconstructed at each position on the surface of this two-dimensionally heterogeneous sample with 30 microm pixel size. Evidence for four types of self-assembled colloidal crystalline structures is provided by the reconstructed data of the drop demonstrating the feasibility of the method.