Abstract
The maturity of current detectors based on technologies that range from solid state to gases renewed the interest for X-ray polarimetry, raising the enthusiasm of a wide scientific community to improve the performance of polarimeters as well as to produce more detailed theoretical predictions. We will introduce the basic concepts about measuring the polarization of photons, especially in the X-rays, and we will review the current state of the art of polarimeters in a wide energy range from soft to hard X-rays, from solar flares to distant astrophysical sources. We will introduce relevant examples of polarimeters developed from the recent past up to the panorama of upcoming space missions to show how the recent development of the technology is allowing reopening the observational window of X-ray polarimetry.
Highlights
X-ray polarimetry still remains nowadays a vastly unexplored field in astronomy, but the recent development of new technologies will allow us in a near future to deeply observe many astrophysical sources with measurements with high significance level
Accelerated electrons emits via non-thermal bremsstrahlung [13] and their emission can be highly polarized [14]. Another field of investigation for X-ray polarimetry is comprised of sources, the emission of which originates in strong magnetic fields that channel matter accretion along field lines, creating aspherical
In the last years X-ray polarimetry in astronomy started to be a crowded field of new theoretical studies, instrument designs and detectors, which flew on board balloon experiments or Derived from https://physics.nist.gov/PhysRefData/Xcom/html/xcom1.html
Summary
X-ray polarimetry still remains nowadays a vastly unexplored field in astronomy, but the recent development of new technologies will allow us in a near future to deeply observe many astrophysical sources with measurements with high significance level. Spectroscopy and timing being well-developed techniques in X-ray astronomy, polarimetry remains an observational tool that is less advanced with respect to the other wavelengths. The basic concepts of polarimetry at high energy and the typical relevant detector systematics are discussed in Sections 3 and 4, respectively.
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