Femtosecond X-ray Imaging

Marvin Seibert is a Research Associate for the Coherent X-ray Imaging instrument at SLAC’s Linac Coherent Light Source.

Program Description

Extremely intense and very short pulses of X-rays from the first hard X-ray Free-Electron Laser, the Linac Coherent Light Source at SLAC, allow the recording of a diffraction pattern from a macromolecule, a virus or a nanocrystal before the sample is turned into a plasma and explodes. Radiation damage processes can be outrun with this "diffraction-before-destruction" technique and diffraction images can be obtained from single, non-crystalline samples. In the first single particle imaging experiments at the LCLS, individual Mimivirus particles were intercepted and imaged with the X-ray beam. Although the sample was heated to over 100,000K, the reconstructed images show no signs of damage.