Title:	Studying matter under extreme conditions induced by femtosecond high intensity x-rays.
DNr:	NAISS 2023/22-733
Project Type:	NAISS Small Compute
Principal Investigator:	Sebastian Cardoch <sebastian.cardoch@physics.uu.se>
Affiliation:	Uppsala universitet
Duration:	2023-07-03 – 2024-08-01
Classification:	10302
Keywords:

Abstract

X-ray imaging is a widely used method to obtain electronic and structural information about matter. Photons offer element specificity since their interaction with matter is sensitive to the local electronic environment. In structural determination, x-rays have been used to image for small biomolecules such as crystal proteins less than a micron in size down to single particles tens of nanometers in size. Radiation damage is an inescapable detrimental process that takes place within femtoseconds after exposure triggered by photoionization. Depending on the conditions, photons can drive atoms in the material to highly excited states ejecting photoelectrons that cause further damage. At extreme incident x-ray intensities, matter can reach a high energy density state known as warm dense matter. In this work, we would like to study the transition from the ground state to the excited state and from solid density to warm dense matter. The aim is to develop simulation tools, get a better understanding of the relevant processes, and exploit these conditions to advance structural imaging techniques such as coherent and incoherent diffractive imaging.