the nasa technology employed during the stanford msfc llnl rocket x ray spectroheliograph flight established that doubly reflecting, normal incidence multilayer optics can be designed, fabricated, and used for high resolution x ray imaging of the sun. technology developed as part of the msfc x ray microscope program, showed that high quality, high resolution multilayer x ray imaging microscopes are feasible. using technology developed at stanford university and at the doe lawrence livermore national laboratory (llnl), troy w barbee, jr. has fabricated multilayer coatings with near theoretical reflectivities and perfect bandpass matching for a new rocket borne solar observatory, the multi-spectral solar telescope array (mssta) advanced flow polishing has provided multilayer mirror substrates with sub-angstrom (rms) smoothnesss for the astronomical x ray telescopes and x ray microscopes. the combination of these important technological advancements has paved the way for the development of a water window imaging x ray microscope for cancer research