Abstract: The structure of materials can be characterized (e.g., via CD-SAXS) by generating a burst of electron bunches in a pulse train and accelerating the electron bunches to relativistic energies. Meanwhile, an optical cavity is filled with a laser pulse; and the electron bunches collide with the laser pulse in the optical cavity, permitting a single laser pulse to interact with the electron bunch train to generate x-rays via inverse Compton scattering. The generated x-rays are then directed to a sample, and the sample is imaged by measuring the scattering of the x-rays from the sample.

Abstract: A dispersed release of neutrons is generated from a source. A portion of this dispersed neutron release is reflected by surfaces of a plurality of nested, axisymmetric mirrors in at least an inner mirror layer and an outer mirror layer, wherein the neutrons reflected by the inner mirror layer are incident on at least one mirror surface of the inner mirror layer N times, wherein N is an integer, and wherein neutrons reflected by the outer mirror are incident on a plurality of mirror surfaces of the outer layer N+i times, where i is a positive integer, to redirect the neutrons toward a target. The mirrors can be formed by a periodically reversed pulsed-plating process.