Appl. Phys. Lett. 99, 093701 (2011)

The new generation of laser-driven plasma accelerators has come of age: Stefan Kneip and colleagues have applied their previously reported table-top source for spatially coherent synchrotron X-rays (Nature Phys. 6, 980–983; 2011) to the task of imaging the inner workings of various species of fish and fly.

Although hard tissue such as bone absorbs radiation readily enough to be imaged using conventional X-ray sources, the same technique applied to soft tissue is effective only in conjunction with invasive enhancing agents. Phase-contrast imaging is a more broadly applicable tool, but requires the spatial coherence achieved from a synchrotron.

Kneip et al. have a different solution: by ionizing a milliscale plume of helium gas with a high-power pulsed laser beam, they can set up a plasma wakefield that incites electronic oscillations resulting in the emission of highly spatially coherent synchrotron radiation. For creatures such as the damselfly (pictured), the upshot is that its delicate wing structure can be imaged without using invasive agents. Moreover, the ultrashort pulse duration set by the incident beam means that the technique still works while the damselfly squirms — and hence will have broad implications for research in biomechanics.