Research Opportunities at LCLS

September 2011

Joachim Stöhr

Five Revolutions in “light”

• 1879 - Invention of the light bulb

• 1895 - Discovery of X-Rays

• 1960 - Invention of the LASER

• 1970 - Synchrotron radiation x-rays - SSRL

• 2009 - The first x-ray laser - LCLS

The speed of things – the smaller the fast manifestation of the physical concept of “inertia” = resistance to motion, action, or change

atoms

“electrons” & “spins”

macromolecules

molecular groups

Laser flash

The new science paradigm: Static “structure” plus dynamic “function”

Future technological

speeds

Present technological

speeds

Lasers

X-ray Lasers

Important areas of LCLS research

Because of their size, atoms and “bonds” can change fast but how do systems evolve? key areas of interest:

equilibrium (phase diagrams of complex materials…)

close to equilibrium (operation or function of a system…)

far from equilibrium (transient states like a chemical reaction…)

far, far from equilibrium(matter during inertial confinement fusion…)

“Equilibrium”: What is the structure of water?

Small angle x-ray scattering shows inhomogeneity

Disordered soup Ice like clusters

Components probably dynamic – form and dissolve - can we take an ultrafast snapshot??

How do we image with LCLS?

magnetic switching today in 1 ns how fast can it be done?

Electronic circuit Memory cell Magnetic structure of “bit”Computer chip

100 nm

“Close to equilibrium” – how does a device function:e.g. how does a spin current turn the magnetization ?

“bit” in cell

What are the key intermediate reactive species?

end reaction products reaction dynamics & intermediates

“Far from equilibrium”:How does a chemical reaction proceed?

“Far, far from equilibrium”:Warm and hot dense matter

The properties of matter in extreme states - which on earth can only be created transiently on ultrafast time scale-

Sample

“Image before destroy” snapshots femtosecond protein crystallography

• Atoms = electronic cores move slow enough so that “image before destruction” becomes possible at LCLSrequirements: maximum intensity for signal-to-noise pulse length (~10 fs) shorter than atomic motion (100 fs)

LCLS facilities overview

electron beam

x-ray beam

Injector

1km linac 14GeV

AMOSXR

XPP

XCS

CXI

MEC

Near-hall: 3 stations

Far-hall: 3 stations

Undulator hall

132 meters of FEL undulators

Far Experimental Hall

Near Experimental Hall

AMOSXR XPP

XCSCXIMEC

X-ray Transport Tunnel

200 m

Start of operation

Oct-09AMO

Spring-12XCS

February-11CXI

October-10XPP

May-10SXR

MEC Fall-12

Experimental Halls and Operations Schedules

< 30Hz 60Hz 60Hz, 120Hz since Jan 2011

Optical laser versus X-ray free electron laser

Optical laser X-ray laser

• electrons in discrete energy states

• stimulated emission amplified through mirrors

• fixed photon energy

• low energy, long wavelength photons

• compact

• a bunch (~109) of free electrons

• stimulated emission amplified through electron ordering

• tunable photon energy

• high energy, short wavelength photons

• large

The end