An x-ray probe of laser-aligned molecules
Chemical Physics
2008-05-16 v2
Abstract
We demonstrate a hard x-ray probe of laser-aligned small molecules. To align small molecules with optical lasers, high intensities at nonresonant wavelengths are necessary. We use 95 ps pulses focused to 40 mum from an 800 nm Ti:sapphire laser at a peak intensity of 10^12 W/cm^2 to create an ensemble of aligned bromotrifluoromethane (CF3Br) molecules. Linearly polarized, 120 ps x-ray pulses, focused to 10 mum, tuned to the Br 1s --> sigma* pre-edge resonance at 13.476 keV, probe the ensemble of laser-aligned molecules. The demonstrated methodology has a variety of applications and can enable ultrafast imaging of laser-controlled molecular motions with Angstrom-level resolution.
Cite
@article{arxiv.0802.1894,
title = {An x-ray probe of laser-aligned molecules},
author = {Emily R. Peterson and Christian Buth and Dohn A. Arms and Robert W. Dunford and Elliot P. Kanter and Bertold Krässig and Eric C. Landahl and Stephen T. Pratt and Robin Santra and Stephen H. Southworth and Linda Young},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0802.1894},
year = {2008}
}
Comments
4 pages, 4 figures, RevTeX4, corrected typos