CRIF: Development of Ultrafast X-ray Shutters for Chemistry Research

Suny At Buffalo, Amherst NY

Investigators

Abstract

With support from the Chemistry Research Instrumentation and Facilities: Instrument Development (CRIF:ID)program, the Department of Chemistry at SUNY at Buffalo will develop under the direction of Philip Coppens two fast X-Ray shutters for chemistry research at high intensity light sources. One instrument is a pulse selector to allow selection of individual X-ray pulses in standard operating modes of synchrotron rings. The second instrument is a heat-load shutter capable of absorbing the large fraction of the energy of a white X-ray beam that is not used in the polychromatic time-resolved experiment. The shutters will allow extension of atomic resolution time-resolved diffraction methods to shorter lifetime excited species and eventually to mapping of chemical reactions in solids. As Chemistry is often defined as a science of molecular change, time-resolved research at atomic resolution is of central importance. This technology advance will allow utilization of the photon beam in the common operating modes of storage rings and is expected to stimulate this field of research.