Exploitation of microchannel plate optics

This thesis contains work on microchannel plate (MCP) optics as used for X-ray focusing, and can be split into two sections; research and applications.;Research into improving the reflectivity of MCPs is presented which includes results obtained at the Daresbury Synchrotron, and electron microscope analysis. Different treatments performed on Nova Scientific channel plates were shown only to make a improvement to reflectivity in the case of annealing. Evidence for a 300A layer of silica on the surfaces of the microchannels, a result of the acid etching process, was discovered.;The method of bending, or slumping MCPs to a spherical form by Photonis and Nova has been assessed, and X-ray images using slumped plates are presented. The accuracy and reproducibility of the process was not found to be excellent (within 10% of the target radius), but were acceptable for the plates slumped to date.;A comprehensive report is given of the application of channel plates as the imaging device in an Imaging X-ray Fluorescence Spectrometer, firstly at the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory and subsequently in the laboratory in Leicester. The spectrometer successfully imaged a multi-element target, resolving both elementally (down to Fluorine, Z=9) and spatially (to under 2mm) in a 34 hour integration. The concept of Bragg reflection imaging is examined as another use of the spectrometer.