Detection of Extreme UV and Soft X-Rays with Microchannel Plates: A Review

Microchannel plates are becoming widely used in spectroscopy and two dimensional imaging at EUV (100 - 1000 Å) and soft X-ray wavelengths (10 - 100 Å) for astronomy and microscopy. Although bare microchannel plates have low sensitivity (5% - 10% quantum detection efficiency) in this spectral region, use of photocathodes can increase substantially (to 30%-40%) microchannel plate performance. This, combined with the high spatial resolution (<50μm), fast time response (<300 ps), and large effective area (up to 100 mm diameter) achievable with microchannel plates make the latter a very attractive and versatile tool. We discuss the properties of microchannel plates, photocathode materials, and various microchannel plate detector readout schemes that have been used for soft X-ray and EUV detection.