High intensity compact Compton X-ray sources: Challenges and potential of applications

Thanks to the exceptional development of high power femtosecond lasers in the last 15 years, Compton based X-ray sources are in full development over the world in the recent years. Compact Compton sources are able to combine the compactness of the instrument with a beam of high intensity, high quality, tunable in energy. In various fields of applications such as biomedical science, cultural heritage preservation and material science researches, these sources should provide an easy working environment and the methods currently used at synchrotrons could be largely developed in a lab-size environment as hospitals, labs, or museums.