Developing Time-Resolved Experiments at Diamond Light Source

Diamond Light Source has a relatively short bunch length (40 ps) and a flexible bunch structure that allows the time structure of the radiation emitted to be exploited. Synchrotrons have been strongly exploited for their high flux, coherence and polarisation properties, but it is fair to say less so for timing experiments. There is world-wide interest in following chemical reactions in real time, from many minutes to fs. Time scales above milliseconds can usually be studied using physical methods such as heating, mixing etc., but for faster experiments light induction with pulsed lasers using the methodology of pump-probe is required. For reactions faster than tens of ps FEL’s are required but Diamond is uniquely placed to investigate time-scales longer than this and experiments carried out on Diamond will not just be valid scientific measurements on their own, but will also facilitate experiments on these new facilities.