Weigand, M.; Wintz, S.; Gräfe, J.; Noske, M.; Stoll, H.; Van Waeyenberge, B.; Schütz, G.: TimeMaxyne: A shot-noise limited, time-resolved pump-and-probe acquisition system capable of 50 GHz frequencies for synchrotron-based X-ray microscopy. Crystals (Basel) 12 (2022), p. 1029/1-13
10.3390/cryst12081029
Open Access Version
Abstract:
With the advent of modern synchrotron sources, X-ray microscopy was developed as a vigorous tool for imaging material structures with element-specific, structural, chemical and magnetic sensitivity at resolutions down to 25 nm and below. Moreover, the X-ray time structure emitted from the synchrotron source (short bunches of less than 100 ps width) provides a unique possibility to combine high spatial resolution with high temporal resolution for periodic processes by means of pump-and-probe measurements. To that end, TimeMaxyne was developed as a time-resolved acquisition setup for the scanning X-ray microscope MAXYMUS at the BESSY II synchrotron in order to perform high precision, high throughput pump-and-probe imaging. The setup combines a highly sensitive single photon detector, a real time photon sorting system and a dedicated synchronization scheme for aligning various types of sample excitations of up to 50 GHz bandwidth to the photon probe. Hence, TimeMaxyne has been demonstrated to be capable of shot-noise limited, time-resolved imaging, at time resolutions of 50 ps and below, only limited by the X-ray pulse widths of the synchrotron.