Ultrafast Diffractive Imaging with Coherent X-rays
Stefano Marchesini
Lawrence Livermore National Lab
The Fourier inversion of coherent diffraction patterns offers diffraction-limited three dimensional images without the aberrations, inefficiencies and depth-of-field limitations of lens-based tomographic systems. We report experimental images inverted using holographic and computational phase retrieval methods. Ultimately the resolution of X-ray diffraction imaging will be limited by radiation damage. This limit can be overcome using pulses faster than the damage process. The first experimental verification of the principle of flash diffraction imaging using a soft X-ray free-electron laser will be presented. Experiments aimed at the characterization of the dynamics of organic matter under intense radiation and validation of theoretical models will be discussed.
