2026

CFEL Molecular and Ultrafast Science Seminars 2026

22.01.2026 10:00h

Investigating Metal-Insulator Transitions in the liquid phase

Speaker: Hanns Christian Schewe

Location: CFEL SR I+II

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Research team sheds light on the future potential of X-ray imaging and cryo-electron microscopy

09 May 2025

Scientists from DESY, CSSB, CUI, and Uppsala University publish groundbreaking review article.

Breakthrough in laser-alignment for macromolecular single-particle imaging

10 April 2025

Single-particle diffractive imaging (SPI) using X-ray free-electron lasers allows researchers to reconstruct the structure of nanoparticles and biomolecules. However, the technique often requires imaging up to several billion nanoparticles to produce the image and imposes limitations on its clarity and sharpness. Researchers at the Center for Free-Electron Laser Science at DESY, together with international colleagues, recently demonstrated that laser-induced alignment can indeed be achieved to significantly improve molecular imaging techniques. This geometric confinement of the molecules in the x-ray-imaging experiment will greatly facilitate the recovery of the molecular orientation and, therefore, the structure retrieval. It thus overcomes a significant challenge in single-particle diffractive imaging. This novel development further paves the way for solving the three-dimensional structures of proteins and other macromolecules using SPI.

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