Diagnostics of Nanosystems with the Use of Ultrashort X-Ray Pulses: Theory and Experiment (Brief Review)

Abstract

X-ray diffraction analysis is one of the famous widely used methods to study the structure of matter. It is well known that the scattering of ultrashort X-ray pulses can be used in X-ray diffraction analysis. The scattering of such pulses by various multiatomic objects and nanosystems leads to diffraction patterns carrying information not only on the structure of an object but also on the dynamics of processes in this object. Currently, it is technically possible to fabricate intense sources of femto-and attosecond pulses. New theories including the specificity of the interaction of such pulses with matter are not necessarily applied in the X-ray diffraction analysis involving ultrashort pulses. The inclusion of this specificity should lead to a better use of capabilities of sources of ultrashort pulses and to new scientific results. Sources of X-ray ultrashort pulses, widely used methods and new theories of the X-ray diffraction analysis including the specificity of the interaction of such pulses with matter, and modern experiments involving ultrashort pulses are briefly reviewed here.

Peculiarities of Scattering of Ultrashort Laser Pulses on DNA and RNA Trinucleotides

“…We should also add that here we studied scattering on spatially oriented trinucleotides, which is not the case in the experiment using the pump-probe technique. It is well known that this method has a significant advantage over the standard XRD method [ 8 ]. The sample in this method is real, i.e., no additional preparatory procedures are carried out on it, after which the sample may change significantly.…”

“…To study the structure of matter with high temporal resolution, the duration of the X-ray pulse must be shorter than the time scale on which the motion of the electron wave packet unfolds. In this case (e.g., [ 2 , 6 , 8 ]), instead of Equation ( 1 ) …”

“…Such lasers can generate USPs not only of femtosecond but also of attosecond duration [ 13 , 14 ]. Despite this, old theoretical approaches for “deciphering” polyatomic system structures based on the use of Equations ( 1 ) and ( 2 ), which do not take into account the features of interaction of such USPs with complex polyatomic structures are currently used [ 6 , 8 , 15 , 16 , 17 ].…”

Scattering of Ultrashort X-Ray Pulses on Diamonds with NV Centers

“…X-ray diffraction analysis of matter (XRD) using ultrashort pulses (USP) has now gained great importance [1][2][3]. Indeed, using such USPs it is possible to investigate the structure of matter with high temporal and spatial resolution, as the technical capability exists to carry out such investigations.…”

“…Usually, in the theoretical analysis of XRD scattering of X-ray ultrashort pulses are described as scattering of plane waves of infinite duration in time [3,12]. In other words, the specificity of USP scattering on such structures is not taken into account, which leads to inaccurate use of well-known approaches in XRD [3,8]. The femto-and especially attosecond time-resolved scattering processes on such structures have not been well studied and are being actively developed nowadays [8,[13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23].…”