Sébastien Boutet

During my undergraduate studies in Physics at McGill University, I spent a summer at TRIUMF at the University of British Columbia working on heavy ion cooling trap simulations. After graduating with Honours in 1999, I joined Ian Robinson x-ray diffraction group at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where I learned how to perform synchrotron experiments at multiple light source including NSLS, ESRF and the APS. My primary focus during PhD work was on applying known and novel techniques of surface diffraction and coherent diffractive imaging to the study of protein crystals. After some work on large protein crystals surface diffraction at NSLS, most of my efforts shifted to a new beamline at the APS. I participated in the installation and commissioning of this beamline, sector 34ID-C, although I was far from the primary contributor. This nevertheless introduced me to the intricacies of building x-ray beamlines. I then used this beamline for a few years to study the shapes and internal defects of crystals of proteins using newly developed coherent diffractive imaging techniques applied to small crystals. While some successes were achieved, it became clear that limitations exist at synchrotrons due to sample motion and radiation damage. Luckily, as I completed my PhD work in 2005, new light sources were in construction that would remove thee limitations. FLASH in Hamburg and LCLS were soon to come online. I spent a few years at the APS trying to observe shape transforms from protein crystals, with great difficulty, something that LCLS now routinely accomplishes without much effort due to the instantaneous nature of the LCLS measurements.

After completion of my PhD work, I joined SLAC as a Research Associate, drawing a salary from Uppsala University and Janos Hajdu but spending all my time at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory working with the group of Henry Chapman. We spent a couple of years using FLASH to demonstrate the feasibility of using ultrashort FEL pulses for “diffraction-before-destruction” imaging and developing new tools and techniques for FEL research. In 2007, I took a position at LCLS to work on the Coherent X-ray Imaging instrument and worked on the LCLS Ultrafast Science Instrument (LUSI) project to deliver the completed CXI instrument in 2011. Since then, most of my time is spent developing new tools for the CXI instrument and performing cutting-edge x-ray experiments with various members of the LCLS user community.

Research Interests

X-ray and XFEL Technique Development

As a staff scientist working primarily on a beamline at LCLS, my primary interests lie in developing new tools and new techniques to utilize the full capabilities of x-ray FEL beams. The ultimate goal is to take new ideas and perform the first exploratory experiments in a new technique that eventually lead to generally available techniques for users of LCLS. Prime examples are the development of High Resolution Serial Femtosecond Crystallography and novel x-ray imaging techniques that utilize XFEL beams.

X-ray Optics and Instrumentation

New science capabilities and discoveries are usually initiated by new technology. The development of new instrumentation specific to certain classes of x-ray experiments is an important area of research and development. New ideas in x-ray optics to improve capabilities at LCLS are always explored and have led to a highly complex and flexible optical system at the CXI instrument. New instrumentation is constantly being developed to explore new avenues of x-ray research.

Ultrafast X-ray Diffraction

Coherent Diffractive Imaging

The ultimate goal is the study of single particles at high resolution using Coherent Diffractive Imaging in which the image of the object is retrieved from measuring a continuous diffraction pattern alone. This is in principle achievable with an x-ray FEL but represents a great challenge. My interests lie in developing new tools to achieve this ultimate goal, primarily instrumentation and technique but also software and analysis development.