SLAC topics

Lasers RSS feed

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

See related articles below.

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

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...

In this illustration, a near-infrared laser beam hits a piece of ordinary glass and triggers a process called high harmonic generation
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
Press Release

Extraordinarily precise measurements -- within millionths of a billionth of a second and a billionth of a hair's breadth -- show this ‘electron-phonon coupling’...

Illustration of a laser beam triggering atomic vibrations in iron selenide
News Feature

A new X-ray laser technique allows scientists to home in on these single-electron triggers to better understand organic molecules that respond to light, including...

Thymine
News Feature

Researchers at SLAC are already looking at the largely unexplored realm of attosecond science.

News Feature

Ryan Coffee, scientist at the Linac Coherent Light Source, explains in a video interview.

Ryan Coffee