Optical afterburner for an x-ray free electron laser as a tool for pump-probe experiments

We propose a new scheme for two-color operation of an x-ray self-amplified spontaneous emission free electron laser (SASE FEL). The scheme is based on an intrinsic feature of such a device: chaotic modulations of electron beam energy and energy spread on the scale of FEL coherence length are converted into large density modulations on the same scale with the help of a dispersion section, installed behind the x-ray undulator. Powerful radiation is then generated with the help of a dedicated radiator (like an undulator that selects a narrow spectral line), or one can simply use, for instance, broadband edge radiation. A typical radiation wavelength can be as short as a FEL coherence length, and can be redshifted by increasing the dispersion section strength. In practice it means the wavelength ranges from vacuum ultraviolet to infrared. The long-wavelength radiation pulse is naturally synchronized with the x-ray pulse and can be either directly used in pump-probe experiments or cross correlated with a high-power pulse from a conventional laser system. In this way experimenters overcome jitter problems and can perform pump-probe experiments with femtosecond resolution. Additional possibilities like on-line monitoring of x-ray pulse duration (making "optical replica'' of an x-ray pulse) are also discussed in the paper. The proposed scheme is very simple, cheap, and robust, and therefore can be easily realized in facilities like FLASH, European XFEL, LCLS, and SCSS.