2009
2009 has been another productive year
21 December 2009
2009 has been another very productive year for the Bragg Institute. As of mid-December, the Institute published a total of 85 refereed journal articles. In addition, our staff gave a total of 20 invited talks at major national and international conferences in Asia, Europe, America and Australia. To date, 22 refereed articles from the new OPAL instruments have been published, or are in press.
Approvals for Sample Environment and Radiography Station
17 December 2009
In the last week, the Steering Committee for the NBI-2 Project has approved the scope, budget and estimated schedule for two of the five key elements in the $37M Neutron Beam Expansion Project announced in the Australian Government's May 12th Budget Statement: (1) for a suite of Sample-Environment apparatus, including a new cryomagnet/dilution refrigerator combination, a high-end gas-handling system, and various pieces of supporting equipment; and (2) a new purpose-built Neutron Radiography/Tomography/Imaging Station to be installed on beam HB2 in OPAL's Reactor Beam Hall. The sample-environment subproject is led by Paolo Imperia, while the DINGO Radiography/Tomography/Imaging Station is led by Ulf Garbe. We are also in the process of erecting an additional temporary building to house up to 25 staff working on the NBI-2 Project.
OPAL and its Cold Neutron Source Operating Again
14 December 2009
The OPAL Reactor resumed routine operation today following a planned three and a half week shutdown. The cold neutron source has also been operating since Thursday 10th December, and we are optimistic that user experiments can now resume on our PLATYPUS reflectometer and QUOKKA small-angle neutron scattering instrument. Schedules for OPAL and its neutron beam instruments are avaliable on the web.
Three New Faces
7 December 2009
Three new people arrived in the Institute in the last week: Drs. Saurabh Kabra and Anton LeBrun as new postdoctoral fellows, and Dr. Zin Tun, on a 3-month sabbatical from Chalk River in Canada. Saurabh Kabra joins us most recently from the neutron scattering centre at Los Alamos National Laboratory in the USA, and will work with Klaus-Dieter Liss on "Thermo-Mechanical Processing". Anton LeBrun, joins us from the Diamond Light Source in the UK, and will work with the National Deuteration Facility. Zin Tun has a number of in-situ electrochemical experiments in mind using our PLATYPUS reflectometer, but will also likely help with magnetic diffraction experiments on our powder diffractometers.
First Paper from TAIPAN
2 December 2009
The first paper from our TAIPAN Thermal 3-Axis Spectrometer has been accepted for publication in J. Phys. Soc. Japan, as part of the refereed proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Physics of Solid State Ionics in Kumamoto, Japan. The full title and reference is: S. A. Danilkin, M. Yethiraj and G. J. Kearley, "Phonon Dispersion in Superionic Copper Selenide - Observation of Soft Phonon Modes in Superionic Phase Transition". The list of papers from OPAL now runs to 19 articles from 6 instruments.
Success with ARC-LIEF Grants
2 December 2009
The Institute is involved in a total of 3 successful ARC Linkage Infrastructure, Equipment and Facilities grants totalling $1.65M. The grants were for a new single-crystal X-ray diffractometer at Sydney University, and sample-characterisation equipment at each of UNSW and University of Wollongong.
4th Proposal Round Closed
27 November 2009
Our 4th proposal round closed today, with 118 proposals across 6 neutron beam instruments, and both Chemical and Bio-Deuteration at the National Deuteration Facility. Excluding existing approved programs and the mail-in system on ECHIDNA, 623 beam days were requested across ECHIDNA, WOMBAT, KOALA, KOWARI, QUOKKA and TAIPAN. Including strong demand from through the National Science Council of Taiwan, roughly 33% of demand was from overseas (Canada, China, New Zealand, S. Africa, UK, USA, and 6 other countries in Asia and Europe). 46% of demand was from Austalian universities and CSIRO, and 21% from ANSTO itself. These proposals will now go out for external review by up to 5 referees, with the final recommendations on allocation of beam time, by the Program Advisory Committee on 2-3 February 2010. Approved experiments will be run, starting in April 2010. The next proposal round is open, with a closing date of 7th May 2010.
Helium-3 Expert Joins our Team
20 November 2009
Today, Dr Wai Tung (Hal) Lee, commenced with us to lead our Helium-3 Polarisation Project, which we are pursuing in collaboration with ILL-Grenoble. Hal joins us most recently from the Spallation Neutron Source at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in the USA. This technology is new to Australia, and works by taking helium-3 gas which is a neutron absorber, arranging for all the nuclei to be aligned using lasers in a magnetic field, whereupon only those neutrons with magnetic moments pointing in the opposite direction are absorbed when a neutron beam passes through the gas. The project will bring polarised 3He-based neutron polarisers and analysers to several of our instruments, including PELICAN, PLATYPUS, QUOKKA, WOMBAT, SIKA, and possibly TAIPAN. It also has potential as an NMR nucleus, with clinical applications in lung imaging. Dr. Lee has strong experience producing and applying polarised helium-3 gas for neutron scattering applications, and in conducting research on magnetic materials using polarised neutron scattering.
Funding for Food Science Workshop in late-2010
13 November 2009
Today we learnt of success in gaining $24k of external funding from our Government Department (Department of Innovation, Industry, Science and Research), under its International Science Linkages Program, for a workshop in October-November 2010 on "Neutrons and Food: Addressing the challenges of food science in an evolving global environment using novel methods". The workshop will be conducted in Sydney, in partnership with the European Union's NMI-3 Integrated Infrastructure Initiative for Neutron Scattering and Muon Spectroscopy, which has also provided funding support. We expect 70-80 attendees from Australia and around the world. For more details, please contact Elliot Gilbert.
Update on Cold Neutron Source and Availability of PLATYPUS and QUOKKA
13 November 2009
Unfortunately, OPAL's cold neutron source is still out of operation, and we do not expect it to recommence routine service until 14th December 2009, at the earliest. In part, this is due to a planned long reactor shutdown between 18 November and 13 December 2009. This has serious implications for the present proposal round, which closes on 27th November, because we have been building up a backlog of approved user experiments on the two instruments that view the cold source, our PLATYPUS reflectometer and our QUOKKA small-angle neutron scattering instrument. PLATYPUS is currently carrying a backlog of 150 days of approved experiments, from the last 2 proposal rounds, and we have concluded that we cannot fulfil these commitments and offer more beam time in the round that closes on 27 November. The situation on QUOKKA is similar, but we are only carrying a 60-day backlog of approved experiments from the last round. If the cold source does resume operation on 14 December, we should be in a position to offer a limited amount of beam time on QUOKKA in the present proposal round.
Both the OPAL reactor schedule and a list of deadlines at other leading neutron sources is available on the Web.
Our other five operating instruments, ECHIDNA, WOMBAT, KOWARI, KOALA and TAIPAN, all of which view the (thermal) D2O source, are unaffected by the problems with the cold source, and will have the full allocation of beam days in the present proposal round.
Instrument Design Workshop in Washington DC
9 November - 4 December 2009
Over the next 4 weeks, we are holding a Conceptual Design Workshop at the NIST Center for Neutron Research, just outside Washington DC, to firm up and optimise the conceptual design options for the two new instruments fed by the CG2 split cold-guide at the OPAL Reactor. We are very grateful to NIST, and to Drs. John Barker and Dan Neumann for agreeing to host the workshop and participate in it. From the Australian side, the attendees include: Dr. Phil Bentley (guides), Dr. Nicolas de Souza (EMU Backscattering Spectrometer) and Dr. Anna Sokolova (BILBY Small-Angle Neutron Scattering Instrument), along with some attendance by Drs. Shane Kennedy, Frank Klose, Robert Knott and Oliver Kirstein. Dr. Bentley is presently employed by the Institut Laue Langevin (Grenoble, France) and Dr. de Souza by Forschungszentrum Juelich (Germany), and both will commence new jobs with the Bragg Institute in January 2010. The whole effort is part of the NBI-2 Project announced by the Australian Government in its Budget Statement of 12th May 2009.
Success in ARC Discovery and Marsden Fund Grants
27 October 2009
In the current round, the Institute was involved in one successful ARC Discovery grant for $550k over 4 years, with the University of Wollongong. The title of the award is "Materials science and superconductivity in the new Fe-based high-temperature superconductors". We were also involved with a successful Marsden Fund grant with University of Auckland (New Zealand) for a possible total of NZ$300k. The title of this award is "Probing the Effects of Oxidative Stress on Cellular Membranes".
Update on Cold Neutron Source
13 October 2009
For the period July-September 2009, the OPAL Reactor has run well, with an overall availability of 87% and a reliability of 84% (as measured against the original published schedule). However, we continue to experience major difficulties with the out-of-pile systems for the cold neutron source, and have only run with cold neutrons for 6 days in the last 3 months: although the cold neutron source was successfully restarted on 6th October, the turbine in the cold box seized on 13 October. A spare turbine has been fitted, and before restarting, we await guidance from the manufacturer in Europe, once they have investigated the root cause of the problem. At the time of writing we do not have an estimate for a return to cold-neutron service. We will keep our users informed as new information comes in.
We also continue to operate under an inflexible fuel management strategy, which has led to far more schedule changes than we desire. Despite these difficulties, our four diffractometers (ECHIDNA, WOMBAT, KOWARI and KOALA) used 90% of the available beam days in the last quarter, with KOALA the only instrument using less than 95%. User experiments have comprised 62% of the available reactor days on these 4 diffractometers, with the proportion as high as 78% on WOMBAT.
Staff Changes in the Institute
26 October 2009
This week, our new Project Engineer/Group Leader Mr. Paris Constantine joined us as a key member of the management team on the $37M Neutron Beam Expansion Project, which is responsible for building a new split cold guide on CG2 and delivering 3 new instruments. Paris joins us most recently from the Anglo-Australian Observatory, which operates the largest optical telescope in Australia.
In addition, we bade farewell to Paul Hathaway, who leaves us after 9 years in a range of software positions, to take up an exciting new position at the Diamond Light Source, just outside Oxford in England. We wish him well in the new role there.
Research from OPAL on Cover of Advanced Engineering Materials
26 October 2009
Research using neutron and X-ray diffraction (on our KOWARI strain scanner, along with synchrotron radiation at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility) is featured on the cover of this month's edition of Advanced Engineering Materials. The work, on time-dependent texture measurements on the age-old problem of plastic deformation in copper, was done by Kun Yan, Klaus-Dieter Liss, Ulf Garbe and Oliver Kirstein in the Institute, along with other authors at ESRF and U. of Wollongong. The full reference is K. Yan, K.-D. Liss, U. Garbe, J. Daniels, O. Kirstein, H. Li and R. Dippenaar: "From single grains to texture", Advanced Engineering Materials 11/10, 771-773 (2009).
First Polarisation Analysis at OPAL
21 October 2009
The first polarised neutron reflectivity from a magnetic sample has been measured using the polarisation system of our time-of-flight reflectometer PLATYPUS. The sample under test was a thin film (~750 Å) of Nickel on a silicon substrate, magnetised with a 1T electromagnet (Bruker) at the sample stage. The neutrons are polarised using a (m=4) Fe/Si supermirror which reflects the unwanted spin direction and transmits the desired spin. After reflection from the sample the neutron spins are analysed with a similar supermirror before detection. Further control of the neutron spin is made possible by two radio frequency spin flipper coils. All the gaps between each of the optical elements are equipped with a magnetic guide field to maintain the neutron spin direction. The figure shows the first data recorded with both polarisation and analysis of the neutron spin in comparison with an unpolarised neutron beam. This first commissioning phase of the polarisation system confirmed the expected operation of all polarisation components.
Helping our Canadian Friends Out
6 - 12 October 2009
Profs. Sean Cadogan (left) and Dominic Ryan (right)
with instrument scientist Max Avdeev
This week, we have hosted Profs. Dominic Ryan (McGill University, Montreal) and Sean Cadogan (University of Manitoba) for experiments on our ECHIDNA high-resolution powder diffractometer on "the O(II) to O(I) structural transition in Gd5(Si,Ge)4". This is part of our effort to assist the Canadian neutron community, while the NRU Reactor at Chalk River is shut down. Prof. Ryan is President of the Canadian Institute of Neutron Scattering, their user society, and he also gave a seminar while at the Institute on "Why can't you use thermal neutrons to study gadolinium-based materials?"
New Bus Service to/from Sutherland Railway Station
19 October 2009
Effective today, and in response to feedback from our users, ANSTO is commencing a new express mini-bus service between Sutherland Railway Station and ANSTO (with stops at the Motel and Reception/Security). It is for a trial for 6 months, with a one-way cost of $5. The first weekday bus in the morning leaves Sutherland Station (Bus Bay 1) at 8.30, and the last leaves ANSTO in the evening at 19.00. A more limited service will run on Saturdays, Sundays and Public Holidays (with the exception of December 25th and January 1st). The full timetable is available on the web. The CityRail timetable with train times to/from Sydney (use Eastern Suburbs & Illawarra Line), and to/from Wollongong (use South Coast Intercity Line) are available.
Cold Source Operating Again
6 October 2009
The 20-litre liquid-deuterium cold neutron source, which feeds the guides to our QUOKKA small-angle neutron scattering instrument and PLATYPUS neutron reflectometer went back into routine operation today. It had been out of operation since 23rd July 2009, following a failure of one of two main compressors. A second replacement compressor failed in September, due to an unrelated and different cause. We are now optimistic that normal operations can resume, and that both PLATYPUS and QUOKKA will soon be taking data again.
Poster Prize at IEEE School on Magnetics
20-25 September 2009
One of our graduate students, Thomas Saerbeck (with University of Western Australia), has won the Best Student Poster Prize at the 2009 IEEE Magnetics Society Summer School in Nanjing, China. The award was for his poster on the analysis of Co/CuMn multilayers showing a unique temperature-dependent interlayer coupling, as determined by polarised-neutron reflectometry.
New Scientific Coordinator for our User Office
6 October 2009
We are very glad to welcome Dr. Joseph Bevitt as our new Scientific Coordinator, with responsibility for our User Office. Joseph joins us most recently from the Research Office at University of Sydney, and he fills the position vacated by Herma Buttner in April 2009. Since then, Richard Garrett has been acting in the role, but he too is now moving to bigger and better things supporting ANSTO's Executive Team. We wish Richard well in his new role.
4th Call for Proposals at OPAL (and the National Deuteration Facility)
2 October 2009
The 4th call for proposals is open, including for the first time the National Deuteration Facility's Chemical Deuteration Service, with a deadline of 27th November 2009. All 7 initial instruments (powder diffraction, SANS, reflectometry, strain scanning, single-crystal diffraction, triple axis) are included, in addition to bio-deuteration. Proposal review will take place in December and January, with the Program Advisory Committee meeting in early February. The first experiments in this round are likely to be scheduled in April 2010.
New Postdoc arrives to work in "Neutrons for the Hydrogen Economy"
28 September 2009
Today, Mr Neeraj Sharma joined us as a postdoctoral fellow from the School of Chemistry at Sydney University to work within our Neutrons for the Hydrogen Economy Project, with Vanessa Peterson. Neeraj submitted his PhD thesis in August 2009, under the supervision of Chris Ling - together they published the first article with data from our KOALA Laue Diffractometer earlier this year. Neeraj's initial interest will be in lithium-ion batteries and how to improve them.
Work on Negative-Thermal-Expansion Materials accepted in Angewandte Chemie
22 September 2009
Work led by Vanessa Peterson on materials that contract when heated has been accepted for publication in the prestigious chemistry journal Angewandte Chemie. Density-functional theory and molecular dynamics calculations were performed at ANSTO, along with neutron powder diffraction on our ECHIDNA powder diffractometer, while inelastic neutron scattering data were taken on the TOSCA and NEAT spectrometers at ISIS (UK) and the Berlin Neutron Scattering Centre (Germany). This work also forms part of a broader collaboration between the Institute and Cameron Kepert's group at Sydney University. The full reference is: V. K. Peterson, G. J. Kearley, Y. Wu, C. J. Kepert, A. J. Ramirez-Cuesta and E. Kemner, Explaining Negative Thermal Expansion in Cu3(1,3,5-benzenetricarboxylate)2: A Combined Neutron Scattering and First-Principles Study, Angewandte Chemie in press (2009).
2012 Small-Angle Scattering Conference is coming to Sydney
17 September 2009
Following a vote of the delegates at SAS 2009 in Oxford, we have been successful in a competition to bring SAS 2012, the 2012 International Conference on Small-Angle Scattering, to Sydney. The bid was led by Elliot Gilbert, on behalf of the Australian and New Zealand small-angle communities (with explicit involvement from the Australian Synchrotron, CSIRO and 6 universities). Tentative dates are for 11-15 November 2012.
First Joint Paper from OPAL and Australian Synchrotron
7 September 2009
The first refereed article featuring data from both the Australian Synchrotron (in Melbourne) and the OPAL Research Reactor (here in Sydney) has been accepted for publication in the Journal of Solid State Chemistry. The work was performed on the ECHIDNA high-resolution powder diffractometer at OPAL and the Powder Diffraction Beamline at the Australian Synchrotron, by researchers from Sydney University and staff of the two facilities. The full reference is "Structural Studies of Ba2LaIrO6 - New Light on an Old Problem", Q. Zhou, B. J. Kennedy, M. Avdeev, L. Giachini and J. A. Kimpton, J. Solid State Chem. in press (2009).
Update on Status of Cold Neutron Source
9 September 2009
Unfortunately, on 23rd July 2009, we experienced a failure of one of two primary compressors for our cold-neutron source. The cold source cannot operate, with the reactor at full power, without both compressors. As a consequence, neither the OPAL cold-neutron source itself nor the QUOKKA or PLATYPUS instruments, which are fed by the cold source, have operated since 23 July. At present, an investigation is under way involving the compressor manufacturer and ANSTO, but we do not yet have an estimated date for return to service. Neither QUOKKA nor PLATYPUS can operate until this is resolved. We will attempt to keep our users of these two important instruments advised of any future developments.
Workshop on New Guides, Instruments and Sample-Environment Apparatus
27-28 August 2009
Today ~80 researchers from Australia and overseas attended a large Scoping Workshop at the Institute to discuss both the science and the project details of the 3 new neutron-beam instruments, 2 new cold guides and sample-environment apparatus, funded as part of the $37M NBI-2 Project. Attendees came from 8 Australian universities, 2 CSIRO Divisions, 3 ANSTO Institutes, New Zealand and 8 leading overseas neutron laboratories in the USA and Europe. The workshop report is now available on the web.
Cover of Advanced Engineering Materials
24 August 2009
Work done by our Senior Research Fellow, Klaus-Dieter Liss, his postdoc Ulf Garbe and student Kun Yan, along with others from University of Wollongong and the Advanced Photon Source (Chicago), is featured on the cover of the August 2009 edition of Advanced Engineering Materials. The full title of the featured article is "In-Situ Observation of Dynamic Recrystallization in the Bulk of Zirconium Alloy", Advanced Engineering Materials 11, 637-640 (2009).
First new staff arrive for NBI-2 Project
24 August 2009
Today two new staff, Drs Paolo Imperia and Ulf Garbe, started with the Institute as key players on the $37M NBI-2 Project announced by the Australian Government in its May 12th Budget. They will be project leaders for the suite of Sample-Environment apparatus and Neutron Radiography/Tomography/Imaging station respectively. Both Paolo and Ulf join us from ANSTO's Institute of Materials Engineering: Before that Paolo was at the BESSY synchrotron in Berlin, and Ulf was a postdoctoral fellow in the Bragg Institute.
2nd AONSA School held at ANSTO
16-21 August 2009
The Asia-Oceania Neutron Scattering Association's 2nd Neutron School is being held this week at the Bragg Institute, with 40 students attending from Australia and various other countries in the Asia-Oceania region. This follows on from the highly successful school held in Korea in 2008. The program features lecturers from Japan, Korea and Australia, along with hands-on sessions using the instruments at the OPAL reactor.
IAEA Consultants Meeting held at the Institute
12-14 August 2009
Over the last 3 days, we hosted a Consultants Meeting on Strategic Planning and Regional Networking for Sustainability: Concerted Actions on Neutron Scattering in the Asian-Pacific Region, with attendees from Bangladesh, China, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, New Zealand, Philippines, Singapore and Thailand, as well as Argentina, South Africa and a representative from the European Neutron Scattering Association.
Presidential Early-Career Awards for Scientists and Engineers
9 July 2009
Today, President Obama announced that one of our users, Asst. Prof. Jacob Jones (University of Florida, Gainesville), has been awarded a highly prestigious Presidential Early-Career Award for Scientists and Engineers in the USA. Jacob is a heavy user of our WOMBAT high-intensity powder diffractometer, in collaboration with Andrew Studer (Bragg Institute) and Prof. Mark Hoffmann (UNSW-Materials Science), for time-resolved studies of ferroelectric materials in applied electric fields.
Another awardee, Dr. Craig Brown (NIST Center for Neutron Research) will be coming to the Institute on sabbatical for 3 months in 2010, as part of a 3-person team seconded from NIST during their long shutdown.
The Presidential Early-Career Award for Scientists and Engineers is the highest honor bestowed by the United States government on young professionals in the early stages of their independent research careers.
3rd Instrument Scientist on QUOKKA
3 August 2009
Today, Dr. Kathleen Wood joined us as the third instrument scientist on our QUOKKA Small-Angle Neutron Scattering Instrument. Kathleen did her PhD at the Institut Laue Langevin in Grenoble, France with Prof. G. Zaccai, and joins us directly from a postdoctoral position at University of Groningen in the Netherlands. Her interests are primarily in structural biology, and aside from small-angle scattering, she has a strong background in NMR and inelastic neutron scattering.
First Polarised Neutrons at OPAL
22 July 2009
The first polarised neutron beam at OPAL has been observed using our Platypus time-of-flight neutron reflectometer. The polarised neutron beam is prepared using a (m=4) Fe/Si supermirror in transmission mode installed in the collimation system of Platypus. Neutrons reflected from this supermirror are captured within the collimation system and do not strike the sample under study. The figure shows a comparison between the (spin-down) polarised and the standard non-polarised neutron spectra for Platypus in the absence of a magnetic guide field. The effective bandwidth available for use in future polarized neutron reflectivity experiments is 2.5 Ǻ to 13 Ǻ. The main application for this method is for the study of thin magnetic films and multilayers, like those found in magnetic recording applications, for instance in computer hard drives and the associated read-heads.
3rd Round of OPAL Beam-time Applications
20-21 July 2009
The Bragg Institute Program Advisory Committee met today to assess the 158 neutron-beam proposals submitted by 8 May, requesting 883 days of beam time. For the first time, the committee considered larger 3-year Program proposals, in addition to the normal proposals for individual experiments. 3 programs and 108 experiments were recommended for approval, with beam time allocations as follows: 69 days on Echidna, 122 days on Wombat, 97 days on Kowari, 80 days on Koala, 101 days on Platypus, 60 days on Quokka and 32 days on Taipan. Decision letters concerning the beam-time allocation will be sent in the next few weeks. These experiments will be scheduled for dates commencing in September 2009.
In addition, and for the first time, the Program Advisory Committee assessed 17 proposals to use the Bio-deuteration facilities at the National Deuteration Facility. The chemical deuteration facilities will be open for external use in the next call, which closes on 30 October 2009.
Launch of New Mail-in Service on ECHIDNA
17 July 2009
Today we launched our new "mail-in" neutron powder diffraction service on our ECHIDNA high-resolution powder diffractometer. This service will accept proposals at any time. It is intended for users who require high-quality data for a limited number of samples, for new users, or for users wishing to check samples prior to applying for a normal instrument time allocation. Powder diffraction data will be collected at room temperature and/or liquid-He temperature (4K) using a selection of wavelengths. Experiments requiring temperature scans or other sample environments must, however, go through the normal proposal system. Short turnaround time (within 1-3 weeks after sample shipping) may be expected, as proposals will be reviewed for technical feasibility and safety only. Details may be found on the Bragg Institute web page or by contacting the instrument scientist or our User Office.
Major Reorganisation of the Institute
1 July 2009
Today we implemented two major changes to the structure of the Bragg Institute: (1) the Institute has merged with the National Deuteration Facility; and (2) we have formed a Major Capital Projects Group to manage the $37M NBI-2 Project announced in the Federal Budget of 12th May 2009.
As part of the merger between the National Deuteration Facility with the Bragg Institute, we have formed a new larger "soft-matter" group including all the soft-matter research staff associated with our small-angle scattering machines and reflectometers, together with the chemical and bio-deuteration staff in the National Deuteration Facility. The combined group will be led by Prof. Peter Holden, who will relocate to the Bragg Institute Building. We are about to commence design of a new building extension, designed to hold 150 extra people, which should be sufficient to hold all staff and users for the combined Institute for the next 10 years, in which time we hope to have 18 fully commissioned instruments at OPAL operating in excess of 300 days per year. The new building should be ready in two years time, whereupon the National Deuteration Facility, including all its facilitiues and staff will move into the common home.
We have also appointed Dr. Frank Klose to lead the $37M NBI-2 project, and to coordinate our portfolio of existing capital and commercial projects, including PELICAN, SIKA, KOOKABURRA, the Beryllium-Filter option on TAIPAN, our polarised 3He project with the Institut Laue Langevin, and our commitments to build two data-acquisition and control systems for NECSA in South Africa. Frank is a very experienced scientist/project manager, with extensive relevant experience doing a similar job at the Spallation Neutron Source at Oak Ridge in the USA. He also did much of the work writing the $37M NBI-2 proposal for the Australian Government, and successfully acted for Jamie Schulz as the Institute's Operations Manager, while Jamie was leading ANSTO's Safety & Radiation Services Division for 6 months in 2008-9.
First Paper from KOALA
22 June 2009
The first paper from our KOALA Laue Diffractometer has been accepted for publication in J. Phys.: Conference Series, as part of the refereed proceedings of the 2009 International Conference on Neutron Scattering in Knoxville, Tennessee. The author list includes collaborators from University of Sydney and the Institut Laue Langevin, in Grenoble, France, in addition to ANSTO. The full title and reference is: N. Sharma, T. Soehnel, G. J. McIntyre, R. O. Piltz and C. D. Ling "Structure of BiRe2O6 re-investigated using Single-Crystal Neutron Laue Diffraction".
New Cryogenic Equipment Arrives
12 June 2009
This week, we took delivery of a compact helium-liquifier system. Once it is installed, it will allow us to recover helium from our "wet" cryogenic systems, and this will both reduce costs and give us some measure of independence from restrictions to the supply of liquid helium.
We have also done acceptance testing on our new Oxford Instruments 11-T horizontal-field cryomagnet, which is mainly intended for small-angle scattering experiments, like those on vortex flux-line lattices in superconductors.
Progress on NBI-2 Project
5 June 2009
Following the Government's announcement of $37M for new guides, instruments and sample-environment apparatus on May 12th, we have made a number of key steps in setting the project up. Firstly, our top-level Bragg Institute Advisory Committee has endorsed the basic notion of building a second SANS machine like QUOKKA, a backscattering spectrometer and a neutron radiography/tomography/imaging station, along with the necessary guides and sample-environment apparatus.
We will next flesh out more of the details in a large common workshop, with our user community and overseas experts on 27-28 August. A detailed announcement will go out shortly. The workshop is open to all interested parties.
We have also reconstituted the Beam Instruments Advisory Group, which gave us regular advice during our original instrument construction project between 2000 and 2007, under the chair of Dr. Dan Neumann (NIST Centre for Neutron Research, USA). Other members of the Beam Instruments Advisory Group include: Ken Andersen (ILL), Craig Buckley (Curtin U.), Michi Furusaka (U. of Hokkaido, Japan), Ian Gentle (Australian Synchrotron & U. of Queensland), Eberhard Lehmann (PSI, Switzerland) and Greg Warr (Sydney U.).
Finally, we have placed advertisements for 5 key positions: a project engineer/group leader along with four scientists to project manage (1) the back scattering spectrometer, (2) the radiography/tomography/imaging station, (3) the 2 cold guides, and (4) the new suite of sample-environment apparatus (particularly high-field magnets and low-temperature apparatus).
New Postdoc in Food Science Arrives
1 June 2009
Today Dr Jitendra Mata, previously at the Australian National University in Prof. John White's group, joined us as part of our team working on Food Science, in partnership with CSIRO.
Visit by the Chief Scientist
22 May 2009
Today we hosted a visit to OPAL by Prof. Penny Sackett, the Chief Scientist for Australia. Prof Sackett is shown with OPAL Reactor Manager (Tony Irwin), Bragg Institute Head (Rob Robinson) and ANSTO's CEO (Adi Paterson), working from left to right.
$37M for new Guides and Instruments
13 May 2009
Yesterday the Australian Government announced, in its annual Budget Statement to Parliament, $37M of new capital funding for additional neutron beam instruments at the OPAL reactor. Specifically, these funds are for a new split guide with 2 extra end positions in the CG2 position (between QUOKKA and PLATYPUS), 3 new instruments and extra sample-environment apparatus. The 3 new instruments will be a second small-angle neutron scattering instrument, to complement QUOKKA and KOOKABURRA, a high-resolution cold-neutron spectroscopy instrument and a thermal-beam neutron radiography station. This announcement builds on many years of strategic planning, going back to the Blue-Mountains Workshop held in December 2005, review by the Beam Instruments Advisory Group and Bragg Institute Advisory Committee and submissions as part of the NCRIS process in 2006. Particular thanks are due to Frank Klose for championing the specific funding proposal during the last 6 months.
The next steps are to hire the necessary staff for the project, which is similar in scope to our successful Neutron Beam Instruments Project (2000-2006), hold a workshop (in August or September 2009) with our user community, and reconvene a new Beam Instruments Advisory Group.
Strong Australian presence at ICNS2009 in the USA
3 - 8 May 2009
Australasia was very well represented at this weeks International Conference on Neutron Scattering in Knoxville, Tennessee, with a total of six invited talks. The conference is a follow-on to the highly successful ICNS2005 conference held in Sydney. In addition to the invited talks (two from the Bragg Institute, two from past or future institute staff, and two from AINSE's research fellows), there are a further 8 talks involving ANSTO staff, 5 talks from other Australian institutions and a total of 22 Australian poster presentations.
Some of our work was highlighted in the Materials Research Society's online synopses of the conference, particularly talks on Monday by Alison Edwards (Towards High Impact, High Throughput Chemical Crystallography With Neutrons) and Vanessa Peterson (Negative Thermal Expansion in a Coordination Framework), and a talk on In-Situ Electric-Field Studies of Ferroelectric Ceramics Using Time-Resolved Neutron Diffraction on WOMBAT on Thursday by one of our users/collaborators Prof. Jacob Jones (University of Florida), featuring work he recently performed on our WOMBAT high-intensity powder diffractometer.
First SANS from a protein at OPAL
28 April 2008
We have successfully performed our first measurement of a protein on our QUOKKA small-angle neutron scattering instrument. This is part of our commissioning process for the instrument, but also in order to have secondary standard. The data are on glucose isomerase at a concentration of 12 mg/ml and were collected for 9000 s at a detector distance of 20.2 m, 3600 s at 5.4 m and 1800 s at 1.2 m. Also shown is a fit to the data using the program CRYSON (from Dmitri Svergun's group in Hamburg).
New Leadership for our Scientific Operations Group
27 April 2009
We are glad to welcome Samantha Mickle as the new leader for our Scientific Operations Group, which comprises our sample-environment, laboratory and technical support fuctions in support of user operations. Samantha joins us most recently from an accelerator-operations role at the National Medical Cyclotron, which is run by ANSTO at the Camperdown site in Sydney. We are also very grateful to Dr. Rachel White, who has been acting in this role for the last 8 months.
In addition, our Operations Manager, Dr. Jamie Schulz, has been seconded to the New South Wales Government's Office for Science and Medical Research for a period of a month or so. Jamie will be helping NSW Government with a range of scientific issues. In the mean time, Dr. Frank Klose will act as our Operations Manager.
Changes in our User Office
16 April 2009
After two and a half years running the Institute's User Office, Dr. Herma Buttner is moving on to bigger and better things supporting ANSTO's Executive Team in a Research Policy and Research Management capacity. We wish her well and will miss her greatly. An advertisement will be place shortly for a replacement, but in the mean time, Dr. Richard Garrett is taking over responsibility for the User Office, in an acting capacity. Herma will continue to be supported by ANSTO in her capacity as editor of Neutron News.
New Joint Appointment with UNSW-Physics
6 April 2009
Today, Dr Clemens Ulrich joined the Bragg Institute to take up a joint lectureship between ANSTO and University of New South Wales (School of Physics). Clemens joins us most recently from the Max Planck Institute for Solid-State Physics (Stuttgart, Germany), one of the leading centres for condensed-matter physics in the world.
Pelican detectors arrive
31 March 2009
Today, we took delivery of 205 3He position-sensitive detectors for the PELICAN time-of-flight instrument, from Toshiba in Japan. This follows the first delivery of 5 detectors to the manufacturer for data acquisition electronics in Germany in December 2008. We have now secured all the detectors required for PELICAN.
The radial collimator, which will placed between sample and detectors, has also been delivered by JJ X-ray in Denmark.
Bragg Institute Advisory Committee Meets
26 - 27 March 2009
Bragg Institute Advisory Committee
The Bragg Institute Advisory Committee, which gives strategic advice to the Institute, met today. Two new members joined the panel for the first time: Prof. Masa Arai (J-PARC Centre in Japan) and Prof. Peter Colman (Walter and Eliza Hall Institute). The meeting was also a sad farewell to Dr. Mike Rowe (NIST Centre for Neutron Research in the USA), who has advised ANSTO for many years, going back to the time before the funding for the OPAL Reactor was approved, and to Prof. Rob Burford (University of New South Wales).
Seminar on Lawrence and William Bragg
19 March 2009
John Jenkin seminar on the Braggs
Today we hosted a fascinating seminar on Australia's first Nobel Prize winners, the father and son team of William Henry and William Lawrence Bragg, after whom our Institute is named. They were awarded the 1915 Nobel Prize in Physics, and Lawrence remains to this day the youngest Nobel laureate in any field, and by a wide margin. The seminar speaker was Prof. John Jenkin of La Trobe University in Melbourne: Prof Jenkin has recently published a biography of the Braggs: "William and Lawrence Bragg, Father and Son: The Most Extraordinary Collaboration in Science". The book particularly emphasises their life in Adelaide, where Lawrence was born, and the effect of the First World War on both men.
3rd call for Neutron-beam Proposals
19 March 2009
ANSTO is now calling for proposals for the following neutron-beam instruments and facilities: ECHIDNA (high-resolution powder diffractometer), WOMBAT (high-intensity powder diffractometer), KOALA (Laue diffractometer), KOWARI (strain scanner), PLATYPUS (neutron reflectometer), QUOKKA (small-angle neutron scattering instrument), TAIPAN (thermal 3-axis spectrometer) and Bio-Deuteration (at the National Deuteration Facility - NDF). Proposals should be submitted using our on-line system, http://neutron.ansto.gov.au. Deadline: 8 May 2009. For all neutron instruments, select round May 2009 - neutron. For National Deuteration Facility proposals please use the same portal selecting round May 2009 - deuteration.
First research papers from PLATYPUS and KOWARI
9 March 2009
Data from our PLATYPUS reflectometer features in an article accepted for publication in the journal Macromolecules. The work entitled " Ordered Microphase Separation in Thin Films of PMMA-PBA Synthesized by RAFT: Effect of Polydispersity" is a collaboration with Sydney University. In addition, the first two papers from KOWARI, our strain scanner, have been submitted for publication.
10th Neutron Beam Instrument Funded
2 March 2009
img source: channel-cut crystal used
at USANS instrument at NIST
Today, ANSTO approved funding for KOOKABURRA, an Ultra Small-Angle Neutron Scattering or USANS instrument. The instrument will be placed on the CG3 cold-neutron guide upstream of the PLATYPUS reflectometer. It uses the classical Bonse-Hart method, and will be similar to the recently constructed USANS instrument at NIST. The KOOKABURRA project is led by Christine Rehm and the instrument is expected to be available in mid-2013. It complements our existing pinhole SANS machine, QUOKKA, and will extend the Q-range
down to 3 x 10-5 A-1, which corresponds to objects with sizes up to 20 microns. The main applications will be for soft-matter and biological systems, porous materials, the earth scienes and engineering materials, including potential industrial applications understanding in paints, oil and gas recovery and issues for the steel industry.
First Phonon measured on TAIPAN
16 February 2009
Today, for the first time at OPAL, we measured a phonon on the TAIPAN Themal 3-Axis Spectrometer. A transverse acoustic phonon was measured along the [001] direction in a single crystal of elemental niobium.
First Deliveries for SIKA Cold 3-Axis Spectrometer
6 February 2009
Today we received the first delivered items for the SIKA Cold-Neutron 3-axis Spectometer, roughly 50 m2 of polished black granite for the instrument dance floor. The instrument components move around on high-precision air pads, under computer control, on this dance floor. SIKA, the 9th neutron-beam instrument at the OPAL reactor, is an $8M project funded by the National Science Council of Taiwan, and managed by the National Central University. The next major components, including the double-focussing monochromator system and the main monochromator shielding assembly, will arrive in mid-2009.
Changes on our Advisory Committees
16 February 2009
We are glad to announce a number of key changes to the memberships of the Bragg Institute Advisory Committee, which gives the Institute top-level strategic advice, and our Program Advisory Advisory Committee, which makes recommendations to us regarding prioritisation and balance in our user program, following external peer review of neutron beam time proposals.
Regarding the Bragg Institute Advisory Committee, Profs. Brian O'Connor(Curtin U.) and Yasuhiko Fujii(Japan Atomic Energy Agency) are both stepping down, after serving us in this capacity since the Institute's birth in 2002. We thank them both for their advice, support and feedback over the last 7 years. As replacements, we welcome Prof. Peter Colman (Walter & Eliza Hall Institute, and current Vice-President of the International Union of Crystallography) and Prof. Masa Arai (J-PARC Centre, in Japan) to the committee. The Bragg Institute Advisory Committee will meet next on 26 and 27 March 2009.
Regarding the Program Advisory Advisory Committee, Prof. Jill Trewhella has stepped down, as the inaugural chair of the committee, following her appointment as DVC-Research at Sydney University. We thank her for leading us through the first 18 months of the user program at OPAL. In her place as one of AINSE's two representatives, Prof. Anton Middelberg (U. of Queensland) will join us, as will Prof. Paul Curmi, (University of New South Wales), with special reference to proposals for the National Deuteration Facility which will enter the user program in the coming round. The Australian Neutron Beam Users Group (ANBUG) has also just held elections, and Prof. Brendan Kennedy (U. of Sydney) has been elected as President of ANBUG, succeeding Prof. Craig Buckley (Curtin U.): the ANBUG president serves on the committee ex officio. Prof. Calum Drummond (CSIRO) has also agreed to take over as chair of the Program Advisory Committee. The Program Advisory Committee will likely next meet in June 2009, following a call for proposals in March 2009.
2nd Contract signed with NECSA
21 January 2009
Today we signed a second contract with NECSA, the Nuclear Energy Corporation of South Africa, for the provision of a control and data-acquisition system for the powder diffractometer at their SAFARI-1 research reactor, just outside Pretoria. The system is closely modelled on our system for ECHIDNA. The first system, dating from 16 September 2008, is for their strain scanner.
PLATYPUS breaks 300nm barrier
10 February 2009
Today, for the first time we successfully took neutron reflectivity data on a 325nm thick film, of alumina deposited on silicon. The data were taken on our PLATYPUS neutron reflectometer, which has a design specification of handling films up to 100nm thick. The image shows neutron and X-ray data from the same film: the narrow spacing of the fringes determines the film thickness and indicate that our instrument can operate well in high-resolution mode. In this case the neutron data appear substantially better in quality because there is more contrast between alumina and silicon with neutrons than with X-rays. The sample was prepared by Dr. Gerry Triani in ANSTO's Institute of Materials Engineering.
View Platypus recent results here
First QUOKKA data analysed
4 February 2009
Today, for the first time, we successfully analysed a complete data set from our QUOKKA small-angle neutron scattering instrument. The sample was a phase-separated polymer-blend sample, and 3 data sets, taken with detector distances between 1.26 and 20m, were successfully merged in absolute units.
Contract for Helium-3 Polarisers Signed
23 January 2009
Today we signed a contract with the Institut Laue Langevin in Grenoble, France, for the provision of a state-of-the-art polarised helium-3 system, using the metastable-exchange optical pumping method. Cells using this technology to polarise and analyse neutron beams will eventually be implemented on a number of our instruments, including PELICAN, WOMBAT, PLATYPUS, SIKA and QUOKKA. As part of the project, ANSTO personnel will be seconded to the Institut Laue Langevin, during the construction of the system.
Success with NHMRC
16 January 2009
One of our postdocs, Dr. Andrew Whitten, has just been awarded a prestgious NHMRC Australian Biomedical Fellowship on "How SNARE proteins regulate glucose transport" at the University of Queensland. This will allow him to continue his career, using small-angle scattering of both neutrons and X-rays, and we look forward to seeing Andrew coming back to the Institute as a user.
First Neutrons on Sample on TAIPAN
13 January 2009
Today, for the first time on our TAIPAN thermal 3-Axis Spectrometer, we scattered neutrons from a sample into the main detector. This was a simple calibration scan using a nickel-powder standard, but it is still an important milestone.
New DVC-R at Sydney University
1 January 2009
One of our university joint appointments, Prof. Jill Trewhella, has just been appointed to the prestigious and influential position of Deputy Vice-Chancellor for Research at Sydney University. Jill joined the Bragg Institute and Sydney University in 2005, under the Australian Government's Federation Fellowship scheme. She has had a strong presence, both personally and in the form of postdocs and students using our facilities, since then. This is expected to continue with her new role.