Attosecond pulse generation at the European XFEL

Ultrashort light pulses play an indispensable role in the progress of fundamental science, as they provide the necessary temporal resolution for probing and controlling ultrafast processes in matter.

The purpose of this project is to drive further the theoretical and experimental development of XFELs and provide the user community with new attosecond capabilities at the European XFEL.

The project capitalises on a close collaboration of the accelerator groups at Lund and Uppsala universities with the FEL development groups XFEL and DESY in Hamburg.

In a joint endeavour, the project aimsto design an attosecond undulator line at the European XFEL;to develop new methods for the generation of tunable double attosecond pulses in XFELs;to collaborate on the experimental realisation of attosecond pulse generation at the European XFEL;to extend the VR-supported Swedish engagement into the European XFEL and collaboration on the photon source development.The Swedish FEL user community intensively utilises beam time at the European XFEL and is the 3rd largest user group there after the Germans and Americans.

Swedish users expressed a strong interest in having attosecond capabilities at FELs.

Thus, the development of attosecond capabilities at the European XFEL within this project will be of direct benefit to the Swedish user community.

Furthermore, our joint research groups aim at shaping the attosecond development in the way that enables new ground-breaking research.