Spherically or toroidally curved, double focusing crystals are used in a spectrometer for X-ray diagnostics of an extended X-ray source such as a hot plasma produced in a tokamak fusion experiment to provide spatially and temporally resolved data on plasma parameters such as ion temperature, toroidal and poloidal rotation, electron temperature, impurity ion charge-state distributions, and impurity transport. The imaging properties of these spherically or toroidally curved crystals provide both spectrally and spatially resolved X-ray data from the plasma using only one small spherically or toroidally curved crystal, thus eliminating the requirement for a large array of crystal spectrometers and the need to cross-calibrate the various crystals.

An apparatus, near-electrode imager, for employing nuclear magnetic resonance imaging to provide in situ measurements of electrochemical properties of a sample as a function of distance from a working electrode. The near-electrode imager use the radio frequency field gradient within a cylindrical toroid cavity resonator to provide high-resolution nuclear magnetic resonance spectral information on electrolyte materials.