Figure 1: Measuring single-shot diffraction patterns.
From: Single-particle structure determination by correlations of snapshot X-ray diffraction patterns
(a) Experimental schematic. Micron-sized droplets emitted from an atmospheric pressure nebulizer contain one or multiple polystyrene spheres. As the droplets transit into the aerodynamic lens stack in a N2 carrier gas, evaporation leads to single spheres or aerosol-assembled aggregates of random configurations. These particles accelerate towards the interaction region with a velocity of about 150 m s−1. LCLS X-ray pulses scatter off randomly intersected particles to produce a diffraction pattern recorded on the pnCCD. The unperturbed X-ray beam passes through a hole in the detector. Non-intercepted particles are captured in a particle beam dump. (b) Experimental diffraction patterns from dimers in several orientations, as indicated in the bottom of each image. The incident X-ray fluence, from left to right, is (3.7, 2.9, 4.4, 4.0) × 1010 photons μm−2. Colourbar indicates detector counts. Detector gain is 7 counts per photon, and quantum efficiency is 0.9. Projections of the particles on the plane perpendicular to the X-ray beam direction, corresponding to each shot are also shown.
