The European XFEL: present status and self-seeding option

The European XFEL is a major X-ray Free Electron Laser facility 
located in Germany between the states of Hamburg and Scheleswig-Holstein. It 
is currently under commissioning and it aims at providing short pulses of 
radiation with unprecedented brightness covering the photon energy range 
between below the Carbon K-edge and about 25keV in SASE mode at the 
fundamental harmonic. It is driven by a superconducting linac working in 
burst, high-repetition mode, with a nominal energy up to 17.5 GeV, which 
feeds three separate undulator lines: SASE1 and SASE2, optimized for harder 
X-rays and SASE3, optimized for soft X-ray radiation.  In this seminar I 
will first adress the present status of the European XFEL, mainly from the 
machine viewpoint, and I will then move to discuss the working principles 
and the status of the self-seeding setup, which will be installed at SASE2 
and promises the production of nearly Fourier-limited pulses of radiation 
with increased brightness.