Degradation of Lignin by Infrared Free Electron Laser.

Lignin monomers have attracted attention as functional materials for various industrial uses. However, it is challenging to obtain these monomers by degrading polymerized lignin due to the rigid ether linkage between the aromatic rings. Here, we propose a novel approach based on molecular vibrational excitation using infrared free electron laser (IR-FEL) for the degradation of lignin.

Observation of terahertz coherent edge radiation amplified by infrared free-electron laser oscillations.

A coupling device, which can extract coherent edge radiation (CER) from an optical cavity for a free-electron laser (FEL) without damaging the FEL due to diffraction loss, was developed at Nihon University. We successfully observed the CER beam with a power of 1 mW or more in the terahertz range during FEL oscillation. It is revealed that the CER power changed with the detuning of the optical cavity and the dependence of the CER power on the detuning length differs from that of the FEL power.