title: Optimized staircase profiles for diffractive optical devices made from absorbing materials.
abstract: We report on the optimization of staircase grating profiles for the case of absorbing grating materials. Using a simple numerical algorithm, we determined the grating parameters, maximizing the first-order diffraction efficiency for different numbers of staircase steps. The results show that there is a significant difference between the staircase profiles for nonnegligible and negligible absorption. The obtained solutions are of importance for diffractive optics in the soft-x-ray and extreme-ultraviolet ranges.
authors.affiliation: Laboratory for Micro- and Nanotechnology, Paul Scherrer Institut, CH-5232 Villigen, Switzerland. bernd.noehammer@psi.ch
authors.forename: Bernd
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Nöhammer
authors.forename: Christian
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: David
authors.forename: Jens
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Gobrecht
authors.forename: Hans Peter
authors.initials: HP
authors.lastname: Herzig