Explosion, ion acceleration and molecular fragmentation of methane clusters in the pulsed beam of a free-electron laser

• X-ray lasers offer new possibilities for creating and probing extreme states of matter. We used intense and short x-ray pulses from the FLASH soft x-ray laser to trigger the explosions of CH4 and CD4 molecules and their clusters. The results show that the explosion dynamics depends on cluster size and indicate a transition from Coulomb explosion to hydrodynamic expansion in larger clusters. The explosion of CH4 and CD4 clusters shows a strong isotope effect: The heavier deuterons acquire higher kinetic energies than the lighter protons. This may be due to an extended inertial confinement of deuterons vs. protons near a rapidly charging cluster core during exposure.

Subject headings

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Fysik -- Atom- och molekylfysik och optik (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Physical Sciences -- Atom and Molecular Physics and Optics (hsv//eng)

Publication and Content Type

ref (subject category)

art (subject category)