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Friday, September 23, 2016
LCLS Announcement
Thursday, September 22, 2016
SLAC Press Release
Understanding how a material’s electrons interact with vibrations of its nuclear lattice could help design and control novel materials, from solar cells to high-temperature superconductors.more...
Wednesday, September 21, 2016
Just as Schroedinger's Cat is both alive and dead, an atom or molecule can be in two different states at once. Now scientists have exploited this behavior to make X-ray movies of atomic motion with much more detail than ever before.more...
Thursday, September 15, 2016
Wednesday, August 31, 2016
User Research Admin
Monday, August 29, 2016
LCLS News
A ‘nonlinear’ phenomenon that seemingly turns materials transparent is seen for the first time in X-rays at SLAC’s Linac Coherent Light Source.more...
Wednesday, August 24, 2016
The cryomodule will be put through rigorous paces before it heads off to its final destination at SLAC later this year.more...
Wednesday, August 03, 2016
Two journals, Scientific Data and the Journal of Applied Crystallography, published special collections of papers on Aug. 1 that focus on X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) research.more...
Monday, August 01, 2016
The Mirrors Only Differ by One Atom in Flatness From End to Endmore...
Thursday, July 14, 2016
The new MFX station expands the X-ray laser’s capability and flexibility for biological studies, which are increasingly in demand at SLAC's Linac Coherent Light Source.more...
Wednesday, June 15, 2016
New Delta Undulator Reveals Fast Changes in Matter with Subatomic Detailmore...
Argonne National Lab Press Release
Monday, June 06, 2016
Monday, May 23, 2016
Researchers have made the first microscopic movies of liquids getting vaporized by the world’s brightest X-ray laser at SLAC. The new data could lead to better and novel experiments at X-ray lasers, whose extremely bright, fast flashes of light take atomic-level snapshots of some of nature’s speediest processes.more...
Monday, May 16, 2016
Tuesday, May 10, 2016
Thursday, May 05, 2016
Wednesday, May 04, 2016
Thursday, April 28, 2016
Friday, April 15, 2016
Wednesday, April 13, 2016
Wednesday, April 06, 2016
Monday, April 04, 2016
Thursday, March 31, 2016
Monday, March 14, 2016
Wednesday, March 09, 2016
Tuesday, February 23, 2016
Wednesday, February 10, 2016
A new study with the LCLS X-ray laser could change the way researchers take atomic-level snapshots of important biological machineries, potentially affecting research in drug development, clean energy production and many more areas.
Friday, January 29, 2016
Friday, January 15, 2016
Wednesday, January 06, 2016
Saturday, December 12, 2015
Thursday, November 05, 2015
Monday, November 02, 2015
Thursday, October 22, 2015
Wednesday, October 21, 2015
Friday, October 16, 2015
Tuesday, October 06, 2015
Monday, October 05, 2015
Friday, October 02, 2015
Thursday, September 17, 2015
Wednesday, September 16, 2015
Monday, September 14, 2015
Wednesday, September 09, 2015
Monday, August 31, 2015
Tuesday, August 25, 2015
Monday, August 17, 2015
Wednesday, August 05, 2015
Tuesday, July 28, 2015
Wednesday, July 22, 2015
Monday, July 06, 2015
Monday, June 22, 2015
Wednesday, June 10, 2015
Tuesday, June 09, 2015
Thursday, May 21, 2015
Thursday, May 14, 2015
Tuesday, May 05, 2015
Monday, May 04, 2015
A team led by Stanford University scientists is using software to breathe new life into results from past biological experiments at SLAC’s X-ray laser.more...
Thursday, April 23, 2015
Wednesday, April 01, 2015
Monday, March 23, 2015
Wednesday, March 18, 2015
Monday, March 16, 2015
Tuesday, March 10, 2015
Monday, March 02, 2015
Tuesday, February 17, 2015
Monday, February 16, 2015
Thursday, February 12, 2015
Wednesday, February 11, 2015
Wednesday, February 04, 2015
DESY News
Monday, February 02, 2015
Friday, January 30, 2015
Monday, January 12, 2015
Wednesday, January 07, 2015
Tuesday, December 16, 2014
Thursday, December 11, 2014
Thursday, December 04, 2014
Wednesday, December 03, 2014
Friday, November 21, 2014
Since joining SLAC as director of LCLS a month ago, I’ve learned a tremendous amount and would like to share some initial perspectives and plans.more...
Scientists at the Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory are combining the speed and precision of robots with one of the brightest X-ray lasers on the planet for pioneering studies of proteins important to biology and drug discovery.
Monday, November 17, 2014
Thursday, November 13, 2014
Wednesday, October 15, 2014
Thursday, October 09, 2014
Wednesday, October 08, 2014
Today, I’m pleased to announce that our global search for a leader for the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS), our premier X-ray laser facility, has also successfully come to an end.
Michael Dunne, currently the director for Laser Fusion Energy at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), has agreed to become the next director of LCLS. Mike will officially start in his new position on Oct. 20.
Tuesday, October 07, 2014
Thursday, September 25, 2014
National User Facility Organization (NUFO) News is attached (also available on the NUFO website http://nufo.org/files/news/August%202014%20Annual%20Meeting_Incorporation-2.pdf) Please share this news with your colleagues. The Future of America is the Research of Today Susan White-DePace Executive Administrator for the National User Facility Organization susan.white-depace@nufo.org www.nufo.org 630-252-7172 more...
The LCLS Users' Executive Committee (UEC) holds an annual election to fill positions for rotating members in various science areas (UEC members generally serve 3 year terms). The UEC would appreciate your vote for candidates to serve on the LCLS UEC. more...
Thursday, September 11, 2014
Save the date for an LCLS-II workshop which will be held at SLAC February 9-12, 2015. The workshops will focus on new scientific opportunities enabled by the unique capabilities of LCLS-II. Contact Jerry Hastings/Bill Schlotter for more details.more...
Wednesday, September 10, 2014
Researchers have shown X-ray laser pulses can capture natural motion in a polymer that behaves in unusual ways when heated to a middle ground between its melting point and solid state.more...
Tuesday, September 09, 2014
Wednesday, September 03, 2014
Friday, August 29, 2014
Monday, August 25, 2014
Thursday, August 21, 2014
An experiment at the Department of Energy's SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory revealed a well-organized 3-D grid of quantum "tornadoes" inside microscopic droplets of supercooled liquid helium – the first time this formation has been seen at such a tiny scale.more...
Wednesday, August 06, 2014
SLAC researchers have developed a laser-timing system that could lead to X-ray snapshots fast enough to reveal the triggers of chemical and material reactions.more...
Tuesday, July 22, 2014
Thursday, July 17, 2014
Tuesday, July 01, 2014
See updated call for LCLS Run 11 proposals attached.
UPDATE: For users who require a monochromator, seeded beams can provide 2 to 4 times more photons per pulse than SASE beams, and with similar pulse durations and shot-to-shot intensity fluctuations. The narrow seeded line, 0.4 to 1.1 eV fwhm, for 50 fs pulse duration typically contains an average pulse energy of 0.3 mJ, with occasional shots up to 1 mJ. It is accompanied by a relatively broadband SASE background of comparable total energy. Seeded beams are available from 5.5 keV to 9.5 keV and can be tuned up from a SASE beam in about 30 minutes.
Soft X-ray self seeding has been demonstrated across the range 500-1000 eV. This mode may help users who benefit from more photons through a monochromator or would like a narrow bandwidth but cannot use a monochromator. Soft X-ray seeding development will continue over the next year, and may be available during the October 2014-March 2015 run. Check with srd-sxd@slac.stanford.edu for latest developments and estimated parameters.
Register as a user and submit LCLS proposals through the user portal: https://www-ssrl.slac.stanford.edu/URAWI/ Cathy KnottsUser Research Administration Manager650-926-3191
Friday, June 27, 2014
Monday, June 23, 2014
Wednesday, June 18, 2014
Tuesday, June 17, 2014
In recent years, Gaffney’s group has shown how hydrogen bonds switch between water molecules and resolved questions posed in the 1980s about how important catalysts respond to light and promote chemical reactions.
Thursday, June 12, 2014
Friday, June 06, 2014
Thursday, May 01, 2014
Wednesday, April 23, 2014
Thursday, April 17, 2014
Agostino Marinelli, a postdoctoral researcher in the Accelerator Directorate, has been named the 2014 recipient of the Frank Sacherer Prize from the European Physical Society.more...
Wednesday, April 16, 2014
Thursday, April 10, 2014
Friday, March 28, 2014
Wednesday, March 19, 2014
Sunday, March 16, 2014
Monday, March 10, 2014
Friday, March 07, 2014
Thursday, March 06, 2014
Wednesday, February 05, 2014
Thursday, January 30, 2014
2013 was another exciting year for LCLS, with a record number of new publications and new experiments. By employing novel X-ray optics that allow us to share the LCLS beam between instruments, we can now perform two experiments simultaneously in some cases. This way we are able to carry out 20 percent more experiments. This is very welcome news for the scientific community, as their demand for LCLS time is still steadily rising.
Friday, January 17, 2014
Thursday, December 19, 2013
Wednesday, December 18, 2013
Tuesday, December 17, 2013
An international team led by scientists from two SLAC/Stanford institutes has devised a much faster and more accurate way of measuring subtle atomic vibrations that underlie important hidden properties of materials. This advance will help researchers design new materials with desirable but elusive traits, such as room-temperature superconductivity or the ability to efficiently convert heat into electricity.
Wednesday, December 11, 2013
Sunday, November 24, 2013
Tuesday, November 12, 2013
Friday, October 25, 2013
Thursday, October 24, 2013
Tuesday, October 22, 2013
Tuesday, October 01, 2013
In a detailed study of how intense light strips electrons from atoms, researchers used an X-ray laser, SLAC's Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS), to measure and sort the ejected electrons and discover how this process takes place.more...
Friday, September 27, 2013
by Chi-Chang Kao
Recently, I wrote about a report from the Subcommittee on Future X-ray Light Sources of the Basic Energy Sciences Advisory Committee (BESAC). I want to give you more details about how we've proposed incorporating the report's recommendations into our plans for LCLS-II.more...
Monday, September 09, 2013
A special issue of a physics publication highlights the contributions of SLAC's Linac Coherent Light Source X-ray laser and the few similar lasers around the globe in probing the interaction of light and matter at the scale of atoms and electrons.more...
Tuesday, September 03, 2013
Wednesday, August 28, 2013
Monday, August 26, 2013
As many of you know, last month I participated in an important meeting of the Subcommittee on Future X-ray Light Sources of the Basic Energy Sciences Advisory Committee (BESAC). In January 2013, then Director Bill Brinkman charged BESAC to assess scientific challenges that could best be explored with current and especially future light sources and to describe performance specifications of those future light sources.more...
Friday, August 09, 2013
Thursday, August 08, 2013
Monday, August 05, 2013
Tuesday, July 30, 2013
A new tool at SLAC's LCLS splits X-ray laser pulses in two and allows researchers to precisely control the delay between them. It’s used to trigger and measure ultrafast changes in atoms and molecules.more...
Sunday, July 28, 2013
Researchers from the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory have clocked the fastest-possible electrical switching in magnetite, a naturally magnetic mineral. Their results could drive innovations in the tiny transistors that control the flow of electricity across silicon chips, enabling faster, more powerful computing devices.more...
Thursday, July 25, 2013
On Friday, the new automated access gates at SLAC will begin operating. Gate 17 will be activated first, followed by Sector 30 on Wednesday, July 31. Both gates will allow 24/7 automated access from SLAC's general campus into the laboratory’s accelerator area.more...
Tuesday, July 23, 2013
Friday, July 19, 2013
Across the lab, we’re juggling many important activities, ranging from immediate needs to fantastic new opportunities that might have a profound impact on the lab’s future. It is during these times in particular that we must remember to keep balance in our lives.more...
Wednesday, July 17, 2013
Wednesday, July 03, 2013
Thursday, June 27, 2013
Wednesday, June 26, 2013
A tool developed half a century ago for sorting subatomic particles has been redesigned to measure X-ray laser pulses at SLAC's Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS). The result is a new device that pinpoints the duration of X-ray pulses to within a couple of quadrillionths of a second.more...
Tuesday, June 18, 2013
Thursday, June 13, 2013
Friday, May 31, 2013
Last week, the U.S. Department of Energy conducted a status review of SLAC’s LCLS-II project. Following the review, which focused in part on planning for the possibility of a continuing resolution in fiscal year 2014, we’re working with DOE to refine our contingency plans and keep LCLS-II moving forward.more...
Tuesday, May 28, 2013
To better understand the properties of nanocrystals, a team of researchers explored tiny gold samples with SLAC's Linac Coherent Light Source X-ray laser.
Thursday, May 23, 2013
Thursday, May 09, 2013
Friday, May 03, 2013
Wednesday, April 17, 2013
An imaging technique conceived 50 years ago has been successfully demonstrated at SLAC's Linac Coherent Light Source, where it is expected to improve results in a range of experiments, including studies of extreme states of matter formed by shock waves.more...
Thursday, April 04, 2013
Tuesday, April 02, 2013
Tuesday, March 26, 2013
SLAC researchers demonstrate for the first time how to produce pairs of X-ray laser pulses in slightly different wavelengths, or colors, with finely adjustable intervals between them – a feat that will allow them to watch molecular motion and explore other ultrafast processes.more...
Tuesday, March 19, 2013
Friday, March 15, 2013
Tuesday, March 12, 2013
Monday, March 11, 2013
Wednesday, February 27, 2013
Tuesday, February 19, 2013
Friday, February 15, 2013
Thursday, February 14, 2013
Wednesday, February 06, 2013
The Jan. 29 SLAC Public Lecture, "Quantum Lightswitch: A New Direction in Ultrafast Electronics," is now on YouTube. Joshua Turner, a staff scientist at the Linac Coherent Light Source, explains how the manipulation of atoms' electrons could revolutionize computing.more...
Tuesday, February 05, 2013
Friday, February 01, 2013
by Joachim Stöhr
Last week I announced I will step down from my role as ALD at the end of April to return full time to my passion: science. In this, my last column as an ALD, I want to tell you how much I owe this incredible laboratory.more...
Wednesday, January 30, 2013
The way electrons move within and between molecules, transferring energy as they go, plays an important role in many chemical and biological processes. Now researchers have shown they can manipulate and study the fastest steps in these energy transfers with SLAC's X-ray laser, the Linac Coherent Light Source.more...
Thursday, January 24, 2013
Thursday, January 17, 2013
Thursday, January 10, 2013
Monday, January 07, 2013
Friday, December 21, 2012
Research at SLAC that could lead to the development of specialized drugs to better combat African sleeping sickness was recognized last month by Science as one of the nine runners-up to its selected science "Breakthrough of the Year."
Friday, December 14, 2012
Wednesday, December 12, 2012
Thursday, December 06, 2012
Thursday, November 29, 2012
Thursday, November 15, 2012
Monday, November 12, 2012
Monday, November 05, 2012
Monday, October 29, 2012
Monday, October 22, 2012
Friday, October 19, 2012
Monday, October 15, 2012
Wednesday, October 03, 2012
Thursday, September 27, 2012
Friday, September 14, 2012
Thursday, September 13, 2012
Wednesday, September 12, 2012
Thursday, August 30, 2012
In a paper published today in Nature, an international team of researchers working at SLAC's Linac Coherent Light Source describe a promising new method that directly measures, in atomic detail, how light manipulates electric charge in a material.more...
Scientists working at SLAC's Linac Coherent Light Source have captured the first single-shot X-ray microscope image of a magnetic nanostructure and shown that it can be done without damaging the material.more...
Wednesday, August 29, 2012
In a closeout session capping last week’s Department of Energy CD-2 review for the LCLS-II project, SLAC Director Persis Drell said she was very pleased with the review committee’s report and recommendations.more...
Wednesday, August 15, 2012
Scientists at SLAC's Linac Coherent Light Source recently lined up samples of some of the largest known viruses for an X-ray "photo shoot" that may produce the highest-resolution 3-D images yet of the mysterious specimens.more...
Monday, August 13, 2012
Tuesday, August 07, 2012
The first controlled studies of extremely hot, dense matter have overthrown the widely accepted 50-year-old model used to explain how ions influence each other’s behavior in a dense plasma. The results should benefit a wide range of fields, from research aimed at tapping nuclear fusion as an energy source to understanding the inner workings of stars.more...
Friday, July 27, 2012
Thursday, July 26, 2012
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
LCLS-II, the expansion of the world's most powerful X-ray laser, is slated to begin construction at SLAC in late 2013 and be up and running as soon as the middle of 2018. But first it must pass important project review and approval milestones, Project Director John Galayda said during a brown-bag session on July 11.
Monday, July 16, 2012
Wednesday, July 11, 2012
Technology that helps ground-based telescopes cut through the haze of Earth's atmosphere to get a clearer view of the heavens may also be used to collect better data at cutting-edge X-ray lasers like SLAC's Linac Coherent Light Source.more...
For a series of recent experiments at LCLS, an international research team led by Arizona State University scientists set up a temporary lab at SLAC to grow crystals of biological samples. Because the crystals performed light-induced reactions, the researchers worked in a darkroom and wore night-vision goggles to prepare the samples. more...
Monday, July 02, 2012
In pioneering experiments at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, an international team of researchers used light to break open simple ring-structured molecules and explored their transformations using a powerful X-ray laser.
Thursday, June 28, 2012
Researchers at SLAC have captured the most detailed images to date of airborne soot particles, a key contributor to global warming and a health hazard.
The discovery reveals the particles' surprisingly complex nanostructures and could ultimately aid the understanding of atmospheric processes important to climate change, as well as the design of cleaner combustion sources, from car engines to power plants.
Wednesday, June 20, 2012
Tuesday, June 12, 2012
Thursday, June 07, 2012
Wednesday, June 06, 2012
The molecular power plants that carry out photosynthesis are at the root of a scientific quest to learn how they channel energy from sunlight to split water into oxygen and hydrogen.
Understanding these fundamental processes could help scientists develop technologies that replicate nature’s handiwork to produce cheaper and more efficient fuels.
Monday, June 04, 2012
Thursday, May 31, 2012
An international team led by the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory has proved how the world's most powerful X-ray laser can assist in cracking the structures of biomolecules, and in the processes helped to pioneer critical new investigative avenues in biology.
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
Monday, May 21, 2012
In experiments at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, a powerful X-ray laser blasted solid carbon crystals into a liquid and plasma even faster than expected, raising new questions about how these intense beams interact with matter.
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
An international team of researchers has used SLAC’s Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) to discover never-before-seen behavior by electrons in complex materials with extraordinary properties.
Friday, May 04, 2012
Growing SLAC into the premier photon science laboratory, a key part of our scientific mission, requires us to build and operate world-leading facilities. This means the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) must remain at the cutting edge of hard X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) science and technology across the globe.
Friday, March 09, 2012
Tuesday, March 06, 2012
SLAC’s Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) was a star of the show at this year’s prestigious Celsius Lecture at Uppsala University in Sweden, given by Professor Henry Chapman of the Center for Free-Electron Laser Science, DESY, and University of Hamburg, Germany.
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
Researchers working at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory have used the world’s most powerful X-ray laser to create and probe a 2-million-degree piece of matter in a controlled way for the first time. This feat, reported today in Nature, takes scientists a significant step forward in understanding the most extreme matter found in the hearts of stars and giant planets, and could help experiments aimed at recreating the nuclear fusion process that powers the sun.
Scientists working at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory have created the shortest, purest X-ray laser pulses ever achieved, fulfilling a 45-year-old prediction and opening the door to a new range of scientific discovery.
Monday, January 09, 2012
When an electron is propelled out of an atom’s innermost orbital, the hole the departing electron leaves usually is filled within a few micro-billionths of a second by a different electron moving in from a higher orbital. But is there a way to force the original electron back where it came from, making the atom immune to such electron rearrangements?
Tuesday, January 03, 2012
An international research team headed by DESY scientists from the Center for Free-Electron Laser Science (CFEL) in Hamburg, Germany, has recorded the shortest X-ray exposure of a protein crystal ever achieved. The incredible brief exposure time of 30 femtoseconds (0.000 000 000 000 03 seconds) opens up new possibilities for imaging molecular processes with X-rays.
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
Glennda Chui
After five night shifts of shooting pairs of X-ray pulses through soups of fine sand and gold, Aymeric Robert was tired but exhilarated. The first experiment with an instrument he helped bring into being – the X-ray Correlation Spectroscopy (XCS) instrument at SLAC’s Linac Coherent Light Source – had just ended, launching a new tool for understanding liquids, glasses and other less-than-orderly substances.more...
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Lori Ann White
The LCLS doesn't shut down for Thanksgiving, so LCLS laser division member Ryan Coffee and the rest of his team did the next best thing: They brought Thanksgiving dinner to their experiment.
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Helen Shen
In 2009, when biophysicist Ilme Schlichting and her colleagues applied to use the X-ray laser at SLAC’s Linac Coherent Light Source, they added a radical idea to their proposal: They would make all the data they collected on two viruses and a nanoparticle available to the public one year after the experiment ended. more...
Monday, November 14, 2011
Janet Rae-Dupree
After four hugely successful runs, operation of the Linac Coherent Light Source has been paused briefly to prepare for the Nov. 17 start of Run 5 – the first that will see all six experimental stations come online. more...
Tuesday, November 08, 2011
Using leftover high-speed electrons from SLAC’s Linac Coherent Light Source, researchers have successfully generated intense pulses of light in a largely untapped part of the electromagnetic spectrum – the so-called terahertz gap. more...
Tuesday, November 01, 2011
The Department of Energy has approved a preliminary budget, schedule and design plans for the LCLS-II project, an expansion of SLAC’s Linac Coherent Light Source. This approval, known as “Critical Decision 1” (CD-1), sets the stage for the development of a more detailed engineering plan for the project.more...
Thursday, September 22, 2011
Mike Ross
Diamonds can add more than sparkle and style to X-ray experiments at the Linac Coherent Light Source. They are giving scientists a way to focus the LCLS’s powerful X-rays to a much tinier, brighter point without destroying the very device that does the focusing, according to a report from the Swiss team that created the new diamond-based technology.
Friday, September 16, 2011
When Richard “Dick” Lee arrives at SLAC today to assume his duties heading up the Science, Research and Development Division of the Linac Coherent Light Source, he’ll feel right at home. Lee jokes that he has spent more time over the last few years at SLAC while working at Lawrence Livermore National Lab than he has at Lawrence Livermore.
Tuesday, August 30, 2011
The great thing about SLAC’s Linac Coherent Light Source is that it churns out incredible volumes of data about things no one has ever seen before, such as snapshots of individual viruses. The hard thing is: What to do with all that data? This is the problem that Abbas Ourmazd and colleagues Peter Schwander and Chun Hong Yoon of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee are working on.
Wednesday, August 03, 2011
A new X-ray technique for producing instantaneous nanoscale images of the magnetic polarity in materials has been demonstrated by SLAC scientist Joshua Turner. Such a capability is important for understanding the basics of magnetism and how new “spintronic” materials, which use the "up-down" spins of electrons to furnish the "on-off" instructions currently provided to electronic devices by plus and minus electric charges, would behave in future energy-efficient computers, digital memories and data storage devices. more...
Tuesday, July 05, 2011
Alan Fry
The Linac Coherent Light Source at SLAC is the world’s first hard X-ray free-electron laser, or FEL, and one of the most complex light sources ever developed. Its ultrashort pulses of X-ray laser light, a billion times brighter than any light source before it, are uniquely capable of probing the detailed structure and dynamics of atoms, molecules, and materials. But this brilliant beam is not the only laser at work in the LCLS. Other ultrafast lasers kick off the process that generates the X-ray laser beam and play an essential role in experiments at the LCLS.more...
Monday, June 13, 2011
"It takes a village," as Hillary Clinton famously wrote, "to raise a child." Similarly, says physicist Claudio Pellegrini, it takes an entire scientific community to create a ground-breaking new piece of technology—one that not only adds to the store of human knowledge through its use, but requires its designers to push back scientific and technological frontiers just to build it in the first place. The Linac Coherent Light Source is a case in point. more...
Thursday, June 09, 2011
Brad Plummer
This test undulator is on loan from Argonne National Laboratory and currently resides in SLAC's Building 26, where the Metrology Department's Magnetic Measurement Group is trying out measurement techniques to be used on the LCLS II project, a proposed second X-ray free-electron laser that would expand on SLAC's Linac Coherent Light Source. Originally built for the Advanced Photon Source lightsource at Argonne, this "hybrid" undulator uses permanent magnets interposed with steel poles, an arrangement which helps intensify the magentic field (and which creates the appearance of "teeth"). Unlike LCLS I, the LCLS II will use variable-gap undulators, like this one, in which the movable "jaws" can be opened or closed to alter the properties of X-rays the undulator generates. more...
Monday, February 28, 2011
Kelen Tuttle
In the first 18 months of Linac Coherent Light Source operation, the electron beam that drives the X-ray laser has exceeded expectations—so much so that SLAC’s accelerator operators can offer impressive flexibility in crafting the beam to suit experiments, often changing its performance in mere minutes. more...
Monday, February 07, 2011
Lauren Rugani
The Coherent X-ray Imaging instrument at the Linac Coherent Light Source achieved the first X-ray image from its newly installed detector last Tuesday. The detector was installed inside the instrument’s vacuum-sealed experimental chamber in January. Through this week, CXI instrument scientists will test and adjust the new device in preparation for arrival of the first experimental users this Sunday. more...
Wednesday, February 02, 2011
Two studies to be published February 3 in Nature demonstrate how the unique capabilities of the world’s first hard X-ray free-electron laser—the Linac Coherent Light Source, located at the Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory—could revolutionize the study of life. more...
Monday, December 13, 2010
X-rays entered the Linac Coherent Light Source's Far Experimental Hall for the first time Saturday, as part of commissioning for the Coherent X-ray Imaging instrument. The team of instrument scientists, accompanied by many staff members of the Photon Controls and Data Systems groups, other LCLS staff and a few onlookers welcomed X-rays to CXI shortly before 2:30 p.m. This was followed by several hours of SLAC Radiation Physics Department surveys and validation of the instrument hutch. more...
Friday, October 22, 2010
The third round of experiments at the Linac Coherent Light Source began earlier this month at a whole new level of capability. For the first time they included research with the third LCLS instrument, the X-Ray Pump Probe, whose hard X-rays penetrate deeper into matter than the soft X-rays used by the first two instruments. This makes the LCLS XPP unique in the world. more...
Thursday, September 30, 2010
The X-ray Pump Probe instrument at the Linac Coherent Light Source is installed and ready for its first user experiments several weeks ahead of schedule, thanks in part to funds provided by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. more...
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Last Saturday brought perfect chamber-moving weather, and a handful of SLAC riggers, vacuum assembly personnel and scientists took full advantage of the conditions by moving the central piece of the Coherent X-ray Imaging instrument into the Far Experimental Hall of the Linac Coherent Light Source. The 4,000 pound, red girder and primary chamber assembly made their way to the FEH at one mile an hour, strapped to a flatbed trailer. There, the team guided the instrument down the tunnel incline and into the CXI hutch, the middle of three hutches in the FEH. Assembly crews will spend the next few weeks mounting a further complement of instruments and chambers to the girder in preparation for beam this December. more...
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
Barely two months after publication of the first Linac Coherent Light Source results on hollow atoms, two papers published in Physical Review Letters last Friday unveil the first results for hollow molecules. These studies show that the unprecedented intensity of the LCLS beam can reveal detailed information about a molecule's structure and dynamics. more...
Monday, August 23, 2010
Monday's dedication of the Linac Coherent Light Source celebrated the construction, commissioning and first results from the groundbreaking new scientific tool. more...
Friday, August 20, 2010
Persis Drell
On Friday, April 10, 2009 at 10 p.m. the phone rang. I was sound asleep (lab directors go to bed early on Friday night) and as I struggled to open my eyes, the voice on the other end said "We have a laser!" And with that, the LCLS era at SLAC had begun. more...
Monday, August 16, 2010
Secretary of Energy Steven Chu on Monday dedicated the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS), the world's most powerful X-ray laser, at the Department of Energy's SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory. more...
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
The first published scientific results from the world's most powerful hard X-ray laser, located at the Department of Energy's SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, show its unique ability to control the behaviors of individual electrons within simple atoms and molecules by stripping them away, one by one—in some cases creating hollow atoms. more...
Wednesday, June 23, 2010
The first published scientific results from experiments at SLAC's Linac Coherent Light Source are out! The report, published today in Physical Review Letters, is the first look at how molecules respond to ultrafast pulses of ultra-bright light from the world's most powerful X-ray laser. more...
Monday, June 14, 2010
The first user experiments on the Soft X-ray instrument at the Linac Coherent Light Source wrapped up yesterday. Research led by Andreas Scherz, a physicist at the Stanford Institute for Materials and Energy Science, and Jan Lüning from the University Pierre and Marie Curie in France looked to explain on the nanoscale how magnetic fields switch between "up" and "down" states—a key process used to store data in computers. more...
Wednesday, June 09, 2010
Julie Karceski
On June 7, the X-ray Pump Probe instrument became the first of the Linac Coherent Light Source's scientific instruments to receive hard X-rays. "This is a big milestone for everyone involved," said instrument scientist David Fritz. "Now the fun begins!" more...
Wednesday, May 05, 2010
The U.S. Department of Energy has granted approval for SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory—home of the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS), the world's first hard X-ray laser—to begin planning a second X-ray laser at the laboratory. The LCLS, which began operation in April 2009, generates ultra-fast, ultra-bright pulses of X-ray laser light which are already providing new insights into the atomic world. LCLS-II would give investigators access to new regions of the X-ray spectrum and improved control over the X-ray beam. It will also accommodate a larger number of research scientists working simultaneously. more...
Monday, April 12, 2010
The Linac Coherent Light Source's sixth scientific instrument, the Matter in Extreme Conditions instrument, is blitzing through the project planning and approval stages. Project Manager Richard Boyce and Instrument Scientist Hae Ja Lee hosted a successful review of the Department of Energy milestone Critical Decision 1 in January, and received final approval on March 1. With CD-1, the project's preliminary budget and design plans are now approved, and Boyce and Lee are working hard to obtain approvals to start construction by early next year. more...
Thursday, October 01, 2009
SLAC's Linac Coherent Light Source opened for business this morning, and the first user experiment is now underway. As the world's first hard X-ray laser, the LCLS offers scientists the ability to study the fundamental behavior of atoms and molecules on unprecedented length- and time scales. more...
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
The Linac Coherent Light Source beam will pack a wallop, providing 10 trillion X-ray photons in a flash of about 100 femtoseconds. For comparison, it takes today's best storage-ring-based synchrotron radiation facilities a full second to provide that many photons. Beginning next spring, researchers will begin to conduct experiments with these powerful bursts of X-ray light using the Soft X-Ray instrument, located on the second LCLS beamline to begin operation. more...
Tuesday, September 01, 2009
The sixth and final instrument currently planned for the Linac Coherent Light Source will investigate the extremes of the universe around us. The Matter in Extreme Conditions instrument, supported by DOE Office of Science Recovery Act funds, will allow researchers to create and probe matter at extreme temperatures, extreme pressures and extreme densities. The instrument is slated for completion in 2013. more...
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
Yesterday evening, the Linac Coherent Light Source X-ray beam streamed into the Atomic, Molecular and Optical Science instrument for the first time. more...
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
The Coherent X-ray Imaging instrument, the fourth scientific instrument to be installed at the Linac Coherent Light Source, will view single objects smaller than a micron, or one millionth of a meter—tiny. But even better than that, it may be the first X-ray instrument ever to do so for individual biological molecules when it comes online in 2011. more...
Monday, April 27, 2009
The Linac Coherent Light Source will pack a wallop. When it begins operation later this year, the LCLS will provide 10 trillion X-ray photons in a flash of about 100 femtoseconds—a quadrillion times faster than accomplished by today's best storage-ring-based synchrotron lightsources. When these powerful bursts of X-ray light reach the LCLS Far Experimental Hall in 2012, they will for the first time encounter the X-Ray Correlation Spectroscopy instrument, XCS for short. Using the powerful LCLS beam and a new extension of an experimental technique, the XCS will allow researchers to observe dynamical interactions within molecules on very short time scales. more...
Tuesday, March 03, 2009
After journeying more than 100 meters through undulators and diagnostic equipment, X-rays from the Linac Coherent Light Source will wiggle into the subterranean Near Experimental Hall and, beginning in 2010, zip into the X-ray Pump Probe science instrument. There they will meet a sample undergoing a reaction or in an excited state and, like a camera flash in a dark room, light the sample so that researchers can photograph it in detail. more...
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
When the Linac Coherent Light Source starts producing the world's first hard X-ray laser pulses later this year, they will all be headed to one place: the Atomic, Molecular and Optical science instrument. A complex creature comprising spectrometers, focusing optics, and a synchronized high-power optical laser, the AMO will be the first instrument in operation at LCLS—and the only one until March 2010. more...
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