Novel prospects for control of and with x-rays

The new x-ray free-electron laser facilities deliver x-ray pulses of unpreceded brilliance, allowing even for an efficient driving of transitions in atomic nuclei. Such control could facilitate in the future the development of new energy storage solutions. Switching roles, nuclei can be used to store and control single x-ray quanta. This mutual control of nuclei and x-ray photons opens new experimental perspectives, with applications that profit from the robustness, penetration depth and especially from the focusability of x-rays.