Streak camera shot alignment for analysis of laser-ablated Ti plasma*

An ultrafast streak camera resolves sub-picosecond x-rays from a high- resolution spectrometer, measuring the He-α line and satellites radiated from laser-ablated Ti plasma. Datasets from two classes of targets are investigated: Ti layers embedded under variable depth of Al and variable thickness Ti stripes embedded under Al. Shot-to-shot, the streak camera outputs have variable vertical jitter, high noise, and internal warp which need to be processed before performing statistical analysis. A methodology for aligning the vertical jitter and de-warping streak datasets based on detecting the bottom edge on each shot is explained. Image datasets are temporally aligned within 1 ps, and the brightest He-α resonance line is aligned within 0.5 ps, the maximal temporal resolution of the camera. Preliminary results of Ti embedded under 1 μm of Al indicate a significant redshift in Li-like Ti satellites and the He-α intercombination line, while Ti on the surface indicates significant blue doppler shift due to laser ablation.