Engineering novel materials with structural, electronic and/or magnetic characteristics beyond what is found in bulk systems is possible today through the technique of thin film epitaxy, effectively a method of ‘spray painting’ atoms on single crystalline substrates to create precisely customized thin films or layered structures with atomic arrangements defined by the underlying substrate. The abrupt change of composition at as well as charge and spin transfer across interfaces can also lead to intriguing and important new phenomena testing our understanding of basic physics and creating new functionalities.

We use soft x-ray spectroscopy and scattering to probe and understand the electronic, magnetic and structural characteristics of novel engineered materials such as magnetoelectric multiferroics, i.e. materials that exhibit simultaneous order in their electric and magnetic ground states. These materials hold promise for use in next-generation memory devices in which electric fields control magnetism but are exceedingly rare in bulk form. Engineering magnetoelectric multiferroics by interleaving two or more atomically thin layers is an intriguing new approach. A very recent example is establishing room temperature coexisting ferromagnetic and ferroelectric order in LuFeO₃)_m/(LuFe₂O₄)₁ superlattices. [1] We used soft x-ray spectroscopy and microscopy to characterize the magnetic order and ferroelectric polarization of the system.

Similarly intriguing is engineering the orbital symmetry of emergent quantum states near the Fermi edge at interfaces determining the mobility of interfacial conduction electrons in novel heterostructures. Using soft x-ray linear dichroism (XLD), we investigated the orbital stares of interfacial electrons in Al₂O₃/SrTiO₃ and developed an interesting route to engineer emergent quantum states with deterministic orbital symmetry [2].

[1] J. A. Mundy et al., Nature 537, 523 (2016).

[2] Y. Cao et al., npj Quantum Materials 1, 16009 (2016).

Exciting a ferromagnetic material with an ultrashort IR laser pulse is known to induce a reduction of magnetic order and ultrafast spin diffusion processes . Both processes produce disorder on 100s fs scales and their role in a deterministic creation and switching of magnetic order is still poorly understood. Here, we demonstrate that a nanoscale magnetization-reversal exists in the vicinity of domain walls in the near-surface region of a ferromagnetic Co/Pd thin film upon IR excitation. This magnetization-reversal is driven by the different transport properties of majority and minority carriers through a magnetically disordered domain network. We followed the ultrafast temporal evolution by means of an ultrafast resonant magnetic scattering experiment in surface scattering geometry, which enables to exploit the domain network within the top 3 nm to 5 nm layers of the FM film. We observed magnetization-reversal close to the domain wall boundaries that becomes more pronounced moving closer to the film surface. Its lateral extension has allowed us to measure the ultrafast spin-diffusion coefficients and ultrafast spin velocities for majority and minority carriers upon IR excitation.

In the development of non-conventional solar cells not only the achievements of highest power conversion efficiencies and maximum lifetime of devices is of interest. Also the sustainability of the production process of the devices comes into focus. In order to achieve an all-embracing green technology, the materials applied and the required energy for device fabrication are of importance. Materials in terms of functional components or as additives in the processing should be non-toxic and environmentally friendly. In an optimum approach no organic solvents should be used for the coating of any of the layers of the corresponding devices. High temperature processing steps should be reduced or avoided to increase the energy payback times of the solar cells. Following this idea, we developed hybrid solar cells with an active layer based on low temperature processed titania and a water-soluble polymer [1]. In our approach titania nanoparticles are produced with laser ablation in liquid in order to initiate a functionalization of titania with the polymer for the active layer. Combining these titania nanoparticles and water-soluble poly[3-(potassium-6-hexanoate)thiophene-2,5-diyl] (P3P6T) hybrid solar cells are realized. In order to improve conversion efficiencies of these devices a vertical compositional gradient of the two components of the active layer was introduced. For the fabrication of hybrid photovoltaic devices we applied spray-coating as the deposition method for the active layer which could easily scale-up to industrial cost-effective fabrication. For the deposition of the active layer with laser-ablated particles spray deposition provides a good control of the film thickness. The morphology of the active layer is of major importance for the performance of hybrid solar cells. We are especially interested in how the morphology changes with ongoing deposition process. Therefore we followed the development of the morphology of the active layer in situ with high spatial and temporal resolution. The mesoscale was probed with in situ GISAXS, whereas the crystallinity of the polymer and the inorganic component was investigated with in situ GIWAXS. The changes of the morphology and the influence on photovoltaic performance with the introduction of a compositional gradient are discussed. As the synchrotron-based investigation allowed for a high temporal resolution of 0.1 s, insights into the very first stages of the deposition process were obtained. From the overall situ study improvements for the spray deposition procedure are derived that allow for a better control of the morphology of the devices.

Two new momentum microscopes are presented by SPECS: our newly developed time-of-flight momentum microscope METIS and the energy dispersive and filtered momentum microscope KREIOS. Both are using an optimized lens design which provides simultaneously highest energy, angular and lateral resolution. The lens provides a full 2π solid acceptance angle with highest angular resolution. in contrast to standard ARPES measurements with conventional hemispherical analyzers, electronic structure data from and beyond the 1st Brillouin zone is recorded without any sample movement. In addition the lens of such an instrument can work in a lateral imaging mode for microscopy as well. This enables navigation on the sample and reduces the size of the area under investigation in ARPES down to a few micrometers in diameter. This combination of large acceptance angle, high angular resolution and small acceptance area, makes this instrument the ideal tool for electronic structure studies on small samples or sample areas. the design is compact with a straight optical axis. Operation modes are (k_x,k_y,E_k) data acquisition by operation in energy filtered k-space imaging, (ToF-)PEEM mode, energy-filtered real space imaging and micro-spectroscopy mode.

The 3D (k_x, k_y, E_k) data recording is done with a 2-dimensional delayline detector, with a time resolution of 150 ps and count rates up to 8 Mcps. It uses channelplates with 40 μm spatial resolution. While the x,y position of an incoming electron is converted into k_x,k_y wave vector, the kinetic energy E_k is determined from the flight time t in METIS or obtained directly by the energy filter in KREIOS. Spin-resolved imaging is achieved by electron reflection at a W(100) spin-filter crystal prior to the 2-dimensional delayline detector. Electrons are reflected in the [010] azimuth at 45° reflection angle. Varying the scattering energy one can choose positive, negative, or vanishing reflection asymmetry.

Recent advances in dynamics studies of condensed matter by X-ray photon correlation methods will be discussed. Classical X-ray Photon Correlation Spectroscopy (XPCS) requires a (partially) coherent beam and a reliable detector and has benefitted a lot from recent synchrotron source upgrades and the advent of novel 2D pixel detectors. Weakly scattering systems and fast dynamics can now be characterized much better than only a few years back. The next generation of X-ray sources - X-ray Free-Electron Lasers (XFEL) - will deliver many orders of magnitude more coherent intensity than the present generation of synchrotrons but at the same time the pulsed nature of XFELs requires new XPCS-like techniques to be developed. In the presentation I discuss a few new methods that take advantage of the XFEL pulse pattern and allow dealing with the pertinent problem of beam induced damage to the samples. Examples of Scientific applications in soft- and hard-condensed matter will be given as well as an outlook to the forthcoming European XFEL facility where time-resolved coherent X-ray experiments will be carried out at the MID station.