Achievements:

1. tr-RIXS at 4 mJ/cm2 for energies A, B, C, and D (pre-edge)
2. Checked and optimized FEL alignment, t0 and overlap with PP laser after reset of machine synchronization

3. Long delay scans for Peak A and C, up to 100 ps
   Problems:

4. Need to reset machine synchronization by BKR

5. Camera scene got stuck, was resolved by DOC

Achievements:

1. Performed tr-RIXS on peak A, B, and C at 2.4 mJ/cm^2
2. Performed tr-XAS on peak A at 3 fluences
3. Performed tr-RIXS on peak A at 4 mJ/cm^2

Problems:

1. BAM delay line compensator was not working due to incorrect macro. DOC and LM fixed the issue.
2. Delay line scan of hRIXS camera was not working as it was still configured for Viking. MT fixed the issue.
3. The new centroiding algorithm (provided natively by the 4137 kernel) is not consistent with integration mode. For the time being, we use an older, manually configured centroiding algorithm developed for a previous user beamtime.
4. tR-XAS results show large changes, but these large changes were not reflected in tr-RIXS.

Achievements:

1. Replaced focusing lens of PP laser and measured focus with knife edge, focus is about 720 micron vert. & 600 horizontal. Horizontal x-ray spot size is 220 micron
2. Adapted fluence calibration for the new spot sizes
3. Optimized spatial and temporal overlap with new lens
4. Performed optical and x-ray intensity & sample damage tests. We found that up to 15% GATT and up to 50% laser power are okay to use, without altering the sample.
5. We started to collect hRIXS data at positive (1ps) and negative (-2ps) delays.

Problems:

1. Few beam dumps.
2. BAM scene not working
3. The new (?) centroiding function produces spectra with different intensity for acquisitions with the same settings. The old algorithm seems to work well.

Achievements:

1. Set up PP laser, find spatial and temporal overlap between FEL and PP laser
2. Optimize MCP and HAMP settings for good XAS signal
3. Find time zero from XAS on sample and optimize for XAS delay scans at 40 deg incidence angle
4. Take a fluence series on XAS delay scan from about 0.1 mJ/cm2 up to 2.5 mJ/cm2

Problems:
Nothing of note

Achievements

1. Start cooling down the sample
2. Align the beamline and deliver the beam into the sample
3. Performed knife edge scans and enlarge the beam horizontal size to 350 um
4. Tuned the VHM bending by checking the hRIXS resolution
5. Performed energy calibration on the 1000 l/mm grating
6. Check XAS and RIXS of the NdNiO3 sample at 20 K, normal incidence, and peak A

Problems:

1. Nothing of note

Shift Plan:

1. Check static RIXS at a few different configuration
2. Check damage threshold with x-ray and laser
3. Find spatial and temporal overlap between laser and x-ray
4. Performed pump-probe XAS and RIXS

X-ray delivery

• 9.3 keV, up to 181 pulses at 564 kHz, 8 - 1.3 mJ
• Issue with pulse energy stability along the pulse train in the morning but optimzed later on in the day

Optical laser delivery

• PP Laser, 800nm, 50 fs, up to 181 pulses @ from 10 Hz to564 kHz

Achievements/Observations

• Optimized Bismuth diffraciton condition on AGIPD
• Collected pump-probe data with Bismuth fixed target
• Aligned PAM and measured arrival time with electron bunch arrival time slope enabled
  • Positive slope and V shape slope measured

Issues

• Issues with beam stability and intenisty.
  • Optimized later on in the day
  • But did not recover what we had yesterday in terms of pulse energy

X-ray delivery

• 9.3 keV, up to 181 pulses at 564 kHz, 1.8 - 1.9 mJ

Optical laser delivery

• PP Laser, 800nm, 50 fs, up to 181 pulses @ 564 kHz and 91 pulses at 282 kHz, stable delivery

Achievements/Observations

• Installed and aligned fixed target for pump-probe measurement
• Measured t0 with fixed target at IRU, scan tool to measure t0 was also tested
• Optimized Bimuth fixed target sample for diffraction condition
• Recorded pump-probe data (30 min 1 hour)
• Spatial and temporal overlap of X-ray and PP laser at PAM

Issues

• Issue with homing smaract stages used in fixed target. Solved by exchanging the stages for now but need to be checked later.
• Difficulties in observing pump-probe signal in online data analysis although diffraction signal could be seen and optmized on the fluorescent paper on DN500 and AGIPD detector
  • Data collected for further offline analysis

Potentially damaged 1.2 mm CVD in XTD2 attenuator. This feature was not present earlier in the week.

Shift summary for 11.8.2023

X-ray delivery

• 9.3 keV, up to 181 pulses at 564 kHz, 1.8 - 1.9 mJ

Optical laser delivery

• PP Laser, 800nm, 50 fs, up to 181 pulses @ 564 kHz and 91 pulses at 282 kHz, stable delivery

Achievements/Observations

• Continued pump-probe data collection for different delays and fluences
• Continued jet automatic alignment testing
• First test of arrival time tuning with BKR

Issues

• Injector Y stage issue still persists. The reason behind the issue might be a faulty econder, the stage is now in open loop. EEE will check the issue on Monday in detail.

Shift summary for 10.8.2023

X-ray delivery

• 9.3 keV, up to 181 pulses at 564 kHz, 1.8 - 1.9 mJ

Optical laser delivery

• PP Laser, 800nm, 50 fs, up to 181 pulses @ 564 kHz and 91 pulses at 282 kHz, stable delivery

Achievements/Observations

• Increased MBK_PSLIT aperture to fully fill the mirror's aperture
• Issue with coordinated MKBs motion solved with the help of EEE and CTRL.
• PP laser was aligned to IRU
• Established temporal overlap between PP laser and X-rays
• Continuation of automatic jet alignment testing
• Measured pump-probe data at different delays and fluences

Issues

• Injector Y stage is moving down without giving sany move command, DOC was informed. PLC experts will contact morning shift crew to investigate further
• Astigmatism of PP laser beam prevents optimal focusing of the beam at the interaction point. LAS has been informed

alignment checks of the CRL2 device as well as the Mono - continuation of both devices together planned for tomorrow
flatfelds for EPIX & AGIPD (needed to be redone because of too low intensity during the previous measurements)
installation of the levitation device and first test measurements

Here is a capture of the observed issue with the SPB shutter the past night.

Observe the two opening/closing incidents: the first kept the shutter "OPEN" signal during 4 minutes aprox., and the second did the same for about 30 seconds.

Not clear the origin of these actions/changes on the status of the signals.

X-ray delivery

• 9.3 keV, up to 181 pulses at 564 kHz, ~1.8 mJ. Overall stable delivery.

Optical laser delivery

• 800 nm, 50 fs, 564 kHz, up to 185 pulses. Overall stable delivery.

Achievements/Observations

• Tested first implementation of new automatic jet alignment device.
• Setup of photon arrival time monitor.

Issues

• No analog output from SPB_MKB_MVE/ACTRL/AX_FINE. Solved by EEE via DOC.
• Issue with MKBs coordinated motions under investigation by CTRL via DOC. Nothing obviously wrong, investigation still ongoing.
• SPB_OHD_SCR/MOTOR/ZOOM and SPB_OHD_SCR/MOTOR/FOCUS not working. Some parameters lost during summer maintenance period. Fixed by DOC/EEE.
• SPB_IRU_INJMOV/MOTOR/Y regulargly going into error state.
• No access to key XFEL/DESY services (elog, Redmine, etc.) for a while.
• SPB optics hutch shutter opened during the night, around 2:10, when we were not present causing a beam delivery interruption of about 5 minutes in SASE1/3.

- finalized the flatfields of the AGIPD at 0.5 MHz
- optimized the performance of the beam (now 850 - 950 uJ)
- measured flatfield and darks for the Jungfrau detector
- optimized the instrument alignment of FEL beam and ALAS to the center of rotation
 

X-ray delivery

• 9.3 keV, ~ 2 mJ, stable delivery except for the intensity slope along the train (fixed later on)

Optical laser delivery

• ns laser for imaging

Achievements/Observations

• Aligned the instrument for MKB focus configuration
• Optimzed MKB focus and detector background
• PCS - Collected data for about 3-4 hours with different sample concentration and crystal sizes.

Issues

• Issue with intensity slope along the pulse train (fixed later in the day)
• Issue with MKB combined motion (DOC informed)

Achievements:

-Re-alighned beam transport from the FEL soource as we seen low phon counts on the spectrometer

-Optimized spectrometer at 1000l/mm grating

-Made energy and curvature calibration

Problems:

-No major problems

Achievements

• Moved spectrometer to 1000 ln/mm and began alignment

Plan for next shift

• Continue optimization of spectrometer with 1000 ln/mm grating

Problems

• At some point we lost signal from the spectrometer and it took some time to find it
• There were several beam lossed between 12 and 13h

Achievements:

- Find course timing with antenna

-Find find timing signla with TR_XAS on the sample

-Measure XAS with laser ON and OFF to find optimal conditions for TR study

-Measure TR_XAS at low T

Problems:

-temperature went up and the cooling was not responing to the change of needle valve. When we tweak a bit transfer line needle valve cooling starts again.