New developments in micro-X-ray diffraction and X-ray absorption spectroscopy for high-pressure research at 16-BM-D at the Advanced Photon Source.

The monochromator and focusing mirrors of the 16-BM-D beamline, which is dedicated to high-pressure research with micro-X-ray diffraction (micro-XRD) and X-ray absorption near edge structure (XANES) (6-45 keV) spectroscopy, have been recently upgraded. Monochromatic X-rays are selected by a Si (111) double-crystal monochromator operated in an artificial channel-cut mode and focused to 5 μm × 5 μm (FWHM) by table-top Kirkpatrick-Baez type mirrors located near the sample stage. The typical X-ray flux is ∼5 × 10(8) photons/s at 30 keV. The instrumental resolution, Δq/qmax, reaches to 2 × 10(-3) and is tunable through adjustments of the detector distance and X-ray energy. The setup is stable and reproducible, which allows versatile application to various types of experiments including resistive heating and cryogenic cooling as well as ambient temperature compression. Transmission XANES is readily combined with micro-XRD utilizing the fixed-exit feature of the monochromator, which allows combined XRD-XANES measurements at a given sample condition.