Institute for Electronic Structure Dynamics
Research
Central Goals
With the new FS-HR beamline, we will combine magnetic order and electronic structure detection schemes to follow new scientific directions in the fields of ultrafast spin physics. We want to identify how electronic excitations control magnetic dynamics. This is essential to understand the role of spin- and orbital degrees of freedom and will allow for probing electronic state occupation changes as basis for subsequent magnetic dynamics. The understanding of fundamental excitations in elemental magnets, their alloys and multilayers, will ultimately enable us to better control magnetic dynamics through the choice of the material and the sample design.
We want to explore how magnetic dynamics become visible in the local electronic structure. This expands our scope to more complex magnetic structures and will hence render X-ray selectivity applicable to study, e.g., Kagome magnets or alter magnets.
Our further aim is to control magnetism via resonant excitations of magnons, phonons and electrons in the terahertz regime. We further want to exploit chiral pumping schemes and excitation by charge currents to gain fundamental insights to angular momentum accumulation and to investigate novel switching mechanisms.
FemtoSlicing High-Resolution
Motivated by new scientific questions and collaborative research in the CRC-TRR227 'Ultrafast Spin Dynamics', the dedicated high-energy resolution FemtoSlicing beamline, FS-HR, is currently being set up, and will allow for simultaneous detection of electronic and magnetic dynamics. The new beamline is funded jointly by HZB and TRR partners (FU, Weinelt) and central instrumentation of the new joint Lab BerLUXS. A novel optical design with highly efficient blazed electron-lithographic structures allows energy resolutions of less than 300 meV in the whole energy range of 3d L3,2 and 4f M5,4 resonances. A specially developed TimePix3 based 2D detector discriminates the slicing signal from background and detects the full undulator harmonics simultaneously, giving access to spectral changes and circular dichroism in fs-resolved X-ray absorption. The installation started in August 2024; we had first light in the beamline in 11/2025. First experiments are planned for early 2026.
