Observation of interference effects in coherent diffraction of nanocrystals under X-ray standing-wave illumination.

Coherent X-ray diffraction is a useful technique for understanding the structure of compact objects including those which can be represented as phase objects. X-rays are highly penetrating and have wavelengths very close to atomic spacing. In this work, gold nanocrystals (on a reflecting substrate) were imaged at the Advanced Photon Source and found to produce a novel double diffraction pattern. Simulations were carried out to explain the experimental diffraction pattern in terms of reflection of the incident beam from the substrate to produce a standing wave. The experimental data were then phased to produce a two-dimensional real-space image of the gold. It is expected that the standing-wave illumination may be a useful tool to aid the convergence of the phasing algorithms for nanocrystals.