Partial Coherence: a Route to Performing Faster Coherent Diffraction Imaging

Coherent diffraction imaging (CDI) typically requires that the light source should be highly coherent both laterally and longitudinally. Beamlines at synchrotrons usually install a monochromator and slits to achieve a highly coherent source, leading to a large reduction of beam flux. We demonstrate that lateral and longitudinal partial coherence can be successfully included in a CDI reconstruction algorithm simultaneously, reducing the associated exposure time by two orders of magnitude. For the experimental case we present this allows the acquisition of CDI data in just 5 seconds compared to 20 minutes for full coherence. This significantly reduces the requirements on the stability of the imaging system as well as providing a route to imaging samples in real-time.