Conference Presentation (After Call)

PUBDB-2025-04737

http://join2-wiki.gsi.de/foswiki/pub/Main/Artwork/join2_logo100x88.png Femtosecond Three-Dimensional Imaging of Single-Protein with Hard X-ray Laser

Xavier, P. L. (Corresponding author) ; Morgan, A.CFEL*XFEL.EU* ; Bielecki, J.XFEL.EU* ; Bean, R.XFEL.EU* ; Li, C.CFEL*XFEL.EU*DESY* ; Zhang, W.CFEL*DESY* ; E, J.XFEL.EU* ; Butola, M.CFEL*Extern*DESY* ; Samanta, A. K.CFEL*XFEL.EU*DESY* ; Küpper, J.CFEL*XFEL.EU*DESY* ; Azubel, M.Extern*XFEL.EU* ; Bushnell, D.Extern*XFEL.EU* ; Boutet, S.Extern* ; Kornberg, R.Extern*XFEL.EU* ; Baker, D.Extern*XFEL.EU* ; King, N.Extern*XFEL.EU* ; Ovchinnikov, S.Extern*XFEL.EU* ; Yang, E. ; Wang, S.Extern*XFEL.EU* ; Kirian, R.Extern*XFEL.EU* ; Maia, F.Extern*XFEL.EU* ; Loh, D.Extern*XFEL.EU* ; Bajt, S.CFEL*XFEL.EU*DESY* ; Chapman, H. N.CFEL*XFEL.EU*DESY*

2025

Abstract: Single-particle diffractive imaging is one of the key foundational goals behind the establishment of X-ray Free-Electron Laser (XFEL) facilities. Outrunning radiation damage, extremely intense femtosecond XFEL pulses open up the possibility of imaging uncrystallized aperiodic single-particles frozen in time at room-temperature at the timescales of atomic and electronic motions and thus enabling the capturing of complete energy landscape of molecules both at ground and excited states with sufficiently large data. Despite the current sample-delivery and background scattering challenges, there has been a steady progress in XFEL-single-particle imaging (XFEL-SPI), especially with large viruses. As a significant-step towards XFEL imaging of the structure and dynamics of uncrystallized single-macromolecules, in this presentation, we report the demonstration of three-dimensional diffractive imaging of an uncrystallized single-protein for the first time using hard-x-ray laser pulses at the European X-ray Free-Electron Laser (EuXFEL)—a highly-significant and much-awaited milestone in biological XFEL-SPI. This opens up several new exciting avenues including, but not limited to, ultrafast time-resolved imaging of dynamics in uncrystallized single-proteins.Funding acknowledgementHuman Frontier Science Program (RGP0010/2017) European Research Council: Frontiers in Attosecond X-ray Science Imaging and Spectroscopy (AXSIS) (ERC-2013-SyG 609920) Joachim Herz Stiftung

Note: Copyright of the recorded presentation is with APS for free and lifetime. Abstract is public. It'd be good to keep this in record, as it is the major public dissemination of the extremely significant breakthrough results obtained in single-particle imaging with XFELs in a major global conference. Full manuscript in preparation.

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Contributing Institute(s):

1. CFEL-Coherent X-Ray Imaging (FS-CFEL-1)

Research Program(s):

1. 633 - Life Sciences – Building Blocks of Life: Structure and Function (POF4-633) (POF4-633)
2. AXSIS - Frontiers in Attosecond X-ray Science: Imaging and Spectroscopy (609920) (609920)
3. DFG project G:(GEPRIS)390715994 - EXC 2056: CUI: Tiefe Einblicke in Materie (390715994) (390715994)

Experiment(s):

1. SPB: Single Particles, clusters & Biomolecules (SASE1)

Appears in the scientific report 2025

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