US Patent 7777187 Apparatus and method for investigating a sample

An apparatus for investigating a sample comprising: a source of beam radiation; a detector for detecting a beam of radiation reflected by the sample and an optical subsystem for manipulating the beam between source and detector wherein the optical subsystem comprises a first optical element arranged in use to angularly deflect the source beam within a given solid angle and a second optical element arranged to focus the beam from the first optical element onto a substantially flat image plane and wherein radiation reflected by the sample passes back through the first and second optical elements to the detector.