Final Report Summary - ELISA (European Light Sources Activities - Synchrotrons and Free Electron Lasers)
Executive Summary:
The ELISA project brought together 17 European synchrotrons and free electron lasers as partner facilities and 4 permanent observers from facilities under construction or in advanced design phase.
Participants were committed to structure the European Research Area by strengthening the links between laboratories, promoting transnational experiments based on scientific merit and supporting cutting-edge instrumentation.
ELISA had a great impact on European users via its Transnational Access program, supporting more than 4300 users to perform more than 2000 experiments, and producing more than 700 scientific publications in peer-reviewed journals. In addition, one of the main spin-off has been the establishment of the European Synchrotron User Organization (ESUO), to answer to users’ needs and help them exploit the facilities at best.
Users took advantage also of the scientific and technical developments produced by the Joint Research Activities: new powerful detectors have been realized as well as record-performing X-Rays optics. Feasibility studies for free electron laser operation will benefit the FELs season to come.
Networking Activities promoted standardization and best practice sharing in the field of communicating science to the general public, paved the ground for software collaborations and supported high level schools for present and future facility users.
More generally, facilites grew together along the lines of future collaborations, standardization and best practice sharing. The involvement of facilities already in their early development stage is one of the ELISA flagships initiatives.
Project Context and Objectives:
The ELISA (European Light Sources Activities – Synchrotron and Free Electron Sources) integrating activity opens up the world’s largest network of synchrotrons and FEL facilities to the entire European user community. It was based on a bottom-up approach targeting a variety of different disciplines.
The project is organized in three main categories:
1. Networking Activities, to improve documentation and communication, bringing in particular the opportunities offered by the consortium to the attention of new potential users and to the general public;
2. Transnational Access Activities, to allow users from EU member states and associated states to have their beamtime and travel fully supported by the project, based on the scientific merit of their proposals. This leads to a better integration of national facilities and avoid duplication of efforts.
3. Joint Research Activities, to bring together scientists from different facilities and countries with common objectives in instrumentation and method development; the results will benefit all network members and again contribute to their integration.
Besides the goals of the single activities, the overall objective of the I3 Consortium was to contribute to the structuring of the ERA (European Research Area) by strengthening the links between the facilities and develop a long-term integration vision on integration on a pan-European scale. Facilities under commissioning or advanced design phase are therefore welcome to join the Consortium as observers in order to facilitate the full exploitation of their innovative potential.
Project Results:
The ELISA project grouped together the world’s largest research infrastructure network: Coordinator role has been to ensure a smooth workflow but in the same time to foster innovative initiatives.
After increase from 3 to 5 the user delegates voting in the Council, the “European Synchrotron User Organization” (www.esuo.org) was funded in 2010. ESUO helped the setup of national users organizations and monitored the needs and critical points of EU transnational open access. It includes delegates from 23 European countries and is expected to have an structuring effect on the European Research Area in the next years.
The first ELISA Networking Activity created a self-standing network of lightsources communicators in order to review and assess activities at synchrotrons in Europe, share best practices and identify projects and collaborations to disseminate research importance at each facility. Joint participation in conferences, creation of a travelling exhibition and an audit of social media are some of its achievements.
The second NA created a Virtual European Data Analysis Centre (VEDAC) for Photon Science, as a first step towards a long-term goal and to define of common interest points and problems at the partner facilities. Several workshops were organized on data format issues; one of the first results is the shared development by 3 facilities (DIAMOND, ESRF and EMBL-Grenoble) of an open source code for visualising large sets of data. PaNDataODI and CRISP FP7 projects will deal with data format and several other computer science topics.
PUSH NA grouped together the leading European Scientist in the pulsed soft and hard X-rays, to share results and discuss future challenges of new generation sources. The main outcome is the development of a common initiative to become a part of the next phase of IRUVX-PP collaboration.
The fourth ELISA NA supported HERCULES (http://hercules-school.eu). Its Annual Session (HAS) involved yearly ~70 young European researchers (PhD students, postdoctoral scientists) trained by experienced scientists for 5 weeks. The uniqueness of such course is the 40% time devoted to practical training, in groups of 4, at the most advanced European synchrotron facilities. Moreover, 3 one-week Specialized Courses (HSCs) where also organized, to provide scientists and R&D engineers with applied knowledge on a specific topic.
The FELINS (Free Electron Lasers Instrumentation and Synchronization) activity developed innovative instruments for beam profiling, synchronization and characterization of FEL pulses. Moreover, it grouped together the best scientist in this field to create a long-term collaboration.
The HIZPAD (High-Z Pixel Array Detectors) JRA, after the evaluation of current state-of-the-art technology, produced CdTe pixel sensors and coupled them to various readout chips. The new detectors developed for material science demonstrated a dramatic increase in detection efficiency without loss in spatial resolution.
The NanoFOX (Nano Focusing Optics for X-rays) JRAdeveloped the technologies needed to fabricate nanofocusing X-rays optics with spatial resolution down to 10nm. In doing this, 3 approaches where used: diffractive, refractive and reflective optics. To ensure regular prototype testing, a rapid-access test infrastructure was also established.
Transnational Access has been the core ELISA activity: 14 partners provided more than 97000 hours of access to European synchrotrons and FELs, corresponding to more than 2000 experiments. Life Science experiments were more than Physics or Chemistry one, and new fields such as Material Science and Environment are emerging. The average proposal success rate is 42%: selection ensures scientific quality while not discouraging proposal submission. More than 30 countries benefited from Transnational Access, testifying its added value for the completion of the European Research Area. See also Impact section and Attachment for detailed analysis and graphs.
Potential Impact:
ELISA promoted leveraging of geographical and economic differences, prevented brain-drain and addressed the needs of ~30.000 users all over Europe.
The main channels of scientific dissemination have been peer-reviewed publications: more than 800 articles have been published during the project, and more are expected in the next months. ELISA was presented at the ECRI2010 conference, on various journals and during open days and school visits to the partner facilities. Finally, the www.wayforlight.eu initiative was launched shortly after project end, as a user-friendly interactive portal for present and potential synchrotron users.
The creation of the European Synchrotron User Organization (ESUO) is the greatest impact initiative of the ELISA project. For the first time European users have met all together to discuss common needs and challenges, share best practices and interact with EC and facilities directors.
The Communicators activity strengthened the links and relations between communicators at the various facilities, fostering standardization, joint participation in conferences and development of common dissemination strategies for the future.
VEDAC succeeded in bringing together software developers of the photon science community who started learning to work together towards common development of high impact products for the facilities.
PUSH had a structuring impact on its pulsed soft and hard X-Rays community, favouring results discussion and promoting common strategies; in particular, PUSH is willing to join the next phase of the IRUVX-PP collaboration.
HERCULES school disseminated the knowledge of the best scientists to present and future light (and neutron) sources users, with 5 weeks courses including 2 weeks of practicals and with the most recent 1 week specialized courses. Most of the scientific programmes have been published in dedicated volumes and all participants received the electronic support material during courses.
FELINS JRA developed cutting edge instrumentation for FEL beam profiling, synchronization and characterization, grouping together the best scientist for a long-term collaboration.
The HIPZAD JRA has demonstrated feasibility of CdTe and CZT hybrid pixel array detectors for material science applications. More than 15 prototypes have been realized and tested proving dramatic increase in detection efficiency without resolution loss. Results have been disseminated through practical tests at selected beamlines and scientific publications on peer reviewed journals.
Through the fabrication of working prototype optics with have been setup at operational beamlines, Nanofocusing Optics JRA (NanoFOX) had an almost immediate impact for the operation of several endstations at ELISA lightsources and beyond. In addition to the physical dissemination of JRA results, oral and poster presentations as well as academic articles published in refereed journals have been produced.
Transnational Access has a multi-faceted positive impact on the European Research Area. Scientific excellence can be proved b y the 700 peer-reviewed publications derived from EU supported experiments. TA prevents brain drain and favours gender equality, and contributes to the “Fifth Freedom” of knowledge. The female share of TA users is 29%, in line with EU standards; but when considering young (< 35 years) researchers, which are 48% of total visitors, it grows up to 36%. Another added value for Transnational Access is that 15% of visitors coming from institutions based in EU-27 countries are from institutions based in New Member States: selection based on merit and full support for travel and stay during experiment foster knowledge dissemination and geographical leveraging. Overall, the percentage of total visits from countries without a national lightsource is quite high (38%), and thus we can state that TA help researchers from these countries to perform their experiments at the best facilities. See attachment for graphs with data cited above.
List of Websites:
Project public website: http://www.elettra.eu/ELISA/
Project Coordinator: Sincrotrone Trieste S.C.p.A. Italy
Project Manager: Dr. Michele Bertolo, Head of Sponsored Research Office at Sincrotrone Trieste, Italy
See attachment for detailed list of project partners.
