title: Molecular structure determination from x-ray scattering patterns of laser-aligned symmetric-top molecules.
abstract: We investigate the molecular structure information contained in the x-ray diffraction patterns of an ensemble of rigid CF(3)Br molecules aligned by an intense laser pulse at finite rotational temperature. The diffraction patterns are calculated at an x-ray photon energy of 20 keV to probe molecular structure at angstrom-scale resolution. We find that a structural reconstruction algorithm based on iterative phase retrieval fails to extract a reliable structure. However, the high atomic number of Br compared with C or F allows each diffraction pattern to be treated as a hologram. Using this approach, the azimuthal projection of the molecular electron density about the alignment axis may be retrieved.
authors.affiliation: Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, Illinois 60439, USA.
authors.forename: P J
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Ho
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Starodub
authors.forename: D K
authors.initials: DK
authors.lastname: Saldin
authors.forename: V L
authors.initials: VL
authors.lastname: Shneerson
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Ourmazd
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Santra