Mainz 2017 – scientific programme
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MO: Fachverband Molekülphysik
MO 19: Clusters II (with A)
MO 19.3: Talk
Friday, March 10, 2017, 11:45–12:00, N 3
The 3D shapes of spinning helium nanodroplets — •B. Langbehn1, Y. Ovcharenko1,2, D. Rupp1, K. Sander3, C. Peltz3, A. Clark4, R. Cucini5, P. Finetti5, M. Di Fraia5, D. Iablonskyi6, A. C. LaForge7, V. Oliver Álvarez de Lara4, O. Plekan5, P. Piseri8, T. Nishiyama9, C. Callegari5, K. C. Prince5, K. Ueda6, F. Stienkemeier7, T. Fennel3, and T. Möller1 — 1TU Berlin — 2European XFEL — 3Univ. Rostock — 4EPFL, Lausanne — 5Elettra-Sincrotrone Trieste — 6Tohoku Univ. Sendai — 7Univ. Freiburg — 8Univ. di Milano — 9Kyoto Univ.
Scattering techniques using intense femtosecond short-wavelength pulses from free-electron lasers (FEL) have been developed to gain an insight into the structure of nanoparticles such as viruses or clusters. Recent pioneering experiments in the hard X-ray range revealed that superfluid helium nanodroplets can gain high angular momentum resulting in large centrifugal deformation [1]. While hard X-ray experiments push towards atomic resolution, full 3D information on the particle shape (and orientation) from a single scattering pattern requires access to the wide-angle scattering signal available only at longer wavelength [2]. We have used intense XUV pulses from the FERMI-FEL to retrieve the 3D shapes of single helium nanodroplets. We follow the evolution from axisymmetric oblate over triaxial prolate to two-lobed droplets with increasing angular momentum, as predicted by the theoretical model of a classical spinning drop.
[1] Gomez et al., Science 345 (2014)
[2] Barke et al., Nat. Comm. 6 (2015)