Fast Tomographic Alignment for Joint Ptychography and Tomography

Abstract: Joint ptychography and tomography (JPT) is a recently developed framework that enables high-resolution reconstruction of 3D volumes with significantly relaxed constraints on probe overlap at adjacent scan positions. In ptychographic X-ray computed tomography (PXCT) experiment scanning translations are controlled with high-precision piezo-stages, while run-out errors of rotational stages are corrected by aligning phase-retrieved projections. However, such projections are by definition not available for JPT and would thus require precise knowledge of the angular positioning of the sample, which is prohibitively limited by hardware precision. Here, we present a method for correcting the misalignment of ptychographic tomography data with respect to the rotation axis without having to retrieve individual phase projections. This will facilitate development and application of JPT in providing fast data-efficient nanotomography experiments.