A new mobile sample-delivery system dedicated to in-flight studies of pristine aerosols and unsupported nanoparticles using X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy at the MAX IV Laboratory in Lund, Sweden, is presented. The aerosol sample-delivery system brings an aerosol from atmospheric pressure to the experimental chamber in a continuous flow, and the design, operation and commissioning results of the system are presented.

A novel analysis method is proposed for X-ray diffraction patterns recorded in single-shot wide-angle X-ray scattering experiments of free-flying single nanoparticles. The crystalline defects in the nanoparticles are characterized by analyzing the angular correlations between Bragg spots in the single diffraction patterns.

Three different approaches are compared for determination of the correlation function from the small-angle neutron scattering data of a powder sample of iron oxide nanoparticles.

A free-film sample environment for neutron scattering, particularly useful for in situ small-angle neutron scattering, is presented, providing a sample area of up to 7 × 20 mm and an average thickness of 500 µm. The instrumental background is reduced by 37% compared with standard Hellma cells, and a helium jacketing of the entire setup provides a minimized H/D exchange with the humidity from air.

Focusing of an X-ray free-electron laser enables the production of ultrahigh-intensity X-ray pulses. X-ray nanobeams of a free-electron laser were generated using reflective focusing optics combined with speckle interferometry.

An optimization procedure of an aerodynamic lens injector with variable geometry is presented. The simulation results are validated by performing experiments on gold and sucrose nanoparticles. This work is envisioned to be an important step towards high-resolution single-particle imaging.

In this work, a single-particle imaging experiment of tick-borne encephalitis virus at the European XFEL was simulated. These simulations allow the optimal parameters of the experimental setup to be obtained for use in future experiments.

Rayleigh-scattering microscopy permits tracking and sizing of aerosolized particles down to 40 nm in diameter. It lays the foundation for lab-based injector development and online injection diagnostics for X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) research.

An overview is given of the SwissFEL soft X-ray free-electron laser (FEL) beamline, called Athos, and its numerous operation modes. In particular, several key hardware components are described, which enable these modes. The main FEL parameters and expected performance figures are also reported.

A methodology based on small- and wide-angle X-ray scattering is proposed for simultaneously quantifying size distribution and degree of crystallinity of nanoparticles. Experimental results are shown for cubic-like CeO₂ nanoparticles.