By Cnr Ifn
The successful application of HHG-based EUV and Soft-X sources to ultrafast spectroscopy and X-ray science has been widely demonstrated but its exploitation is significantly hindered, even today, by the technological complexity of the required setups and the low generation efficiency, particularly when moving towards higher photon energies. This limit underlies the challenging goal of exploring novel approaches to enhance the application perspectives of these sources. Within our facilities, we are currently working on the development of innovative miniaturized microfluidic platforms for EUV generation and manipulation. The microfluidic approach offers the unique advantage of enabling accurate control and tailoring of the harmonic generation conditions at a micrometer scale. Moreover, following this route, we foresee the potential for integrating multiple optical functionalities within a single monolithic chip, thus paving the way to a novel generation of palm-top-size EUV and X-ray experimental stations.
