Numerical model built for the simulation of the earth magnetopause by lobster-eye-type soft X-ray imager onboard SMILE satellite

• Published in: Optics express Vol. 26; no. 12; pp. 15138 - 15152
• Main Authors: Peng, Songwu, Ye, Yizhong, Wei, Fei, Yang, Zuhua, Guo, Yihong, Sun, Tianran
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States 11.06.2018
• ISSN: 1094-4087; 1094-4087
• DOI: 10.1364/OE.26.015138

Solar wind magnetosphere ionosphere link explorer (SMILE) scientific satellite is dedicated to observe solar wind-magnetosphere coupling. The key payload, soft X-ray imager (SXI), is designed to map the location, shape, and motion of dayside magnetospheric boundaries by Angel-type lobster-eye optical system. Contrast to traditional Wolter-type X-ray telescope with very narrow field-of-view, the lobster-eye-type optics has a unique capability of providing wide field of view for panoramic imaging with moderate spatial resolution in soft X-ray band. Since the lobster-eye optics focus X-ray by reflecting of the inner walls of the micro-channel array shaped in spherical surface, traditional optical design tools can't well match to the requirements of simulation for SXI. In this paper, a 3D Angel-type lobster-eye model is designed for simulation of lobster-eye optics and its capability is demonstrated for the applying scenarios including the imaging of point light source, surface light source with uniform and non-uniform intensity distribution. The simulation results are well consistent with those of theoretical estimate.