Heidelberg 2015 – scientific programme

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A: Fachverband Atomphysik

A 29: Interaction with VUV and X-ray light I

A 29.1: Invited Talk

Thursday, March 26, 2015, 11:00–11:30, C/HSW

Electronic structure in high-intensity x-ray fields — •Robin Santra — Center for Free-Electron Laser Science, DESY, Hamburg, Germany — Department of Physics, University of Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany

Generally, the probability that a given atom in a material absorbs an x-ray photon in a single x-ray pulse is much less than unity for storage-ring-based x-ray sources, even for third-generation synchrotron radiation sources. This situation has changed dramatically with the arrival of x-ray free-electron lasers: In the micro-focus of an x-ray free-electron laser, saturation of x-ray photoabsorption is routinely achieved. The immediate consequence is that the overall behavior of matter under such extreme conditions is characterized by efficient multiphoton absorption via a sequence of single-photon absorption events combined with inner-shell decay cascades and collisional ionization processes. In this way, unusual, highly excited states of matter are formed, whose properties and dynamics are challenging to describe theoretically. In this talk, I will discuss progress that has been made towards developing suitable electronic structure tools. The performance of currently available electronic structure tools will be assessed by direct comparison with experimental data.