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SLAC builds and uses various kinds of lasers to do scientific research. 

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PULSE graduate student Jian Chen in a laser lab at SLAC.

News Feature

Switches like this one, discovered with SLAC’s ultrafast ‘electron camera’, could offer a new, simple path to storing data in next-generation devices.

Single Pulse Material Switch
News Feature

In a first, researchers measure extremely small and fast changes that occur in plasma when it’s zapped with a laser. Their technique will have...

LCLS Plasma Expansion
News Feature

The annual conference for scientists who conduct research at SLAC’s light sources engaged about 470 researchers in talks, workshops and discussions.

2018 Users Conference
News Feature

Their work will deepen our understanding of matter in extreme conditions and fundamental particle physics.

Panofsky Fellows 2018
Press Release

To break, or not to break: An unprecedented atomic movie captures the moment when molecules decide how to respond to light.

UED Bond Breaking
Press Release

SLAC’s high-speed ‘electron camera’ shows for the first time the coexistence of solid and liquid in laser-heated gold, providing new clues for designing materials...

UED Gold Melting
News Feature

Research conducted at the atomic scale could help explain how electric currents move efficiently through hybrid perovskites, promising materials for solar cells.

Illustration of what happens when simulated sunlight hits perovskite
News Feature

Combining X-ray and electron data from two cutting-edge SLAC instruments, researchers make the first observation of the rapid atomic response of iron-platinum nanoparticles to...

ultrafast electron diffraction on iron-platinum
News Feature

A new way to observe this deformation as it happens can help study a wide range of phenomena, from meteor impacts to high-performance ceramics...

Image depicting an experiment at LCLS that shocks a tantalum sample
News Feature

This novel method could shrink the equipment needed to make laser pulses billionths of a billionth of a second long for studying ultra-speedy electron...

Press Release

SLAC’s X-ray laser and Matter in Extreme Conditions instrument allow researchers to examine the exotic precipitation in real time as it materializes in the...

A cutaway depicts the interior of Neptune (right) and an illustration of diamond rain (left).
News Feature

Tripling the energy and refining the shape of optical laser pulses at LCLS’s Matter in Extreme Conditions instrument allows researchers to recreate higher-pressure conditions...

Laser engineers with the upgraded Matter in Extreme Conditions optical laser