LBNL is pursuing design studies and the scientific program for a facility dedicated to the production of x-ray pulses with ultra-short time duration, for application in dynamical studies of processes in physics, biology, and chemistry. The proposed x-ray facility has the short x-ray pulse length ({approx}60 fs FWHM) necessary to study very fast dynamics, high flux (up to approximately 10E11 photons/sec/0.1 percentBW) to study weakly scattering systems, and tuneability over 1-12 keV photon energy. The hard x-ray photon production section of the machine accommodates seven 2-m long undulators. Design studies for longer wavelength sources, using high-gain harmonic generation, are in progress. The x-ray pulse repetition rate of 10 kHz is matched to studies of dynamical processes (initiated by ultra-short laser pulses) that typically have a long recovery time or are not generally cyclic or reversible and need time to allow relaxation, replacement, or flow of the sample. The technique for producing ultra-short x-ray pulses uses relatively long electron bunches to minimize high-peak-current collective effects, and the ultimate x-ray duration is achieved by a combination of bunch manipulation and optical compression. Synchronization of x-ray pulses to sample excitation signals is expected to be of order 50 - 100 fs. Techniques for …

This report summarizes results of a research program investigating the fundamental principles underlying the phenomenon of topological disordering in a radiation environment. This phenomenon is known popularly as amorphization, but is more formally described as a process of radiation-induced structural arrangement that leads in crystals to loss of long-range translational and orientational correlations and in glasses to analogous alteration of connectivity topologies. The program focus has been on a set compound ceramic solids with directed bonding exhibiting structures that can be described as networks. Such solids include SiO2, Si3N4, SiC, which are of interest to applications in fusion energy production, nuclear waste storage, and device manufacture involving ion implantation or use in radiation fields. The principal investigative tools comprise a combination of experimental diffraction-based techniques, topological modeling, and molecular-dynamics simulations that have proven a rich source of information in the preceding support period. The results from the present support period fall into three task areas. The first comprises enumeration of the rigidity constraints applying to (1) more complex ceramic structures (such as rutile, corundum, spinel and olivine structures) that exhibit multiply polytopic coordination units or multiple modes of connecting such units, (2) elemental solids (such as graphite, silicon and diamond) …