Structural biology at the European X-ray free-electron laser facility

PubMed Central

Altarelli, Massimo; Mancuso, Adrian P.

2014-01-01

The European X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) facility, under construction in the Hamburg region, will provide high-peak brilliance (greater than 1033 photons s−1 mm−2 mrad−2 per 0.1% BW), ultrashort pulses (approx. 10 fs) of X-rays, with a high repetition rate (up to 27 000 pulses s−1) from 2016 onwards. The main features of this exceptional X-ray source, and the instrumentation developments necessary to exploit them fully, for application to a variety of scientific disciplines, are briefly summarized. In the case of structural biology, that has a central role in the scientific case of this new facility, the instruments and ancillary laboratories that are being planned and built within the baseline programme of the European XFEL and by consortia of users are also discussed. It is expected that the unique features of the source and the advanced features of the instrumentation will allow operation modes with more efficient use of sample materials, faster acquisition times, and conditions better approaching feasibility of single molecule imaging. PMID:24914145

Structural biology at the European X-ray free-electron laser facility.

PubMed

Altarelli, Massimo; Mancuso, Adrian P

2014-07-17

The European X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) facility, under construction in the Hamburg region, will provide high-peak brilliance (greater than 10(33) photons s(-1) mm(-2) mrad(-2) per 0.1% BW), ultrashort pulses (approx. 10 fs) of X-rays, with a high repetition rate (up to 27 000 pulses s(-1)) from 2016 onwards. The main features of this exceptional X-ray source, and the instrumentation developments necessary to exploit them fully, for application to a variety of scientific disciplines, are briefly summarized. In the case of structural biology, that has a central role in the scientific case of this new facility, the instruments and ancillary laboratories that are being planned and built within the baseline programme of the European XFEL and by consortia of users are also discussed. It is expected that the unique features of the source and the advanced features of the instrumentation will allow operation modes with more efficient use of sample materials, faster acquisition times, and conditions better approaching feasibility of single molecule imaging. © 2014 The Author(s) Published by the Royal Society. All rights reserved.

Commissioning for the European XFEL facility

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nölle, D.

2017-06-01

The European XFEL is a 4th generation light source based on the Self Amplified Spontaneous Emission (SASE) FreeElectron-Laser concept. It is currently being commissioned in North- Germany. The core installation is a 17.5 GeV superconducting accelerator driving 3 SASE lines with photon energies from 1 to beyond 20 keV range with a maximum of 27.000 pulses per second. The international facility is organized as a limited liability company with shareholders from the contributing countries. DESY has taken over the leadership of the accelerator construction consortium, and will be in charge of the operation of the accelerator complex. The facility was set up with contributions from the 11 shareholder countries, either being hardware systems and/or staff or cash contributions. The construction is almost complete, and the commissioning phase has started by the end of 2015. This contribution will report the status of the accelerator complex with emphasis on the commissioning of the accelerator and an outlook to the commissioning of the SASE 1 FEL line.

Resonant excitation of high order modes in the 3.9 GHz cavity of the Linac Coherent Light Source

DOE PAGES

Lunin, A.; Khabiboulline, T.; Solyak, N.; ...

2018-02-06

Construction of the Linac Coherent Light Source II (LCLS-II) is underway for the world’s first hard x-ray free-electron laser. A central part of the LCLS-II project is a 4 GeV superconducting radio frequency electron linac that will operate in the continuous wave (cw) mode. The linac is segmented into four sections named as L0, L1, L2, and L3. Two 3.9 GHz cryomodules, each housing of eight third-harmonic cavities similar to the cavities developed for the European X-ray Free Electron Laser (XFEL), will be used in section L1 of the linac for linearizing the longitudinal beam profile. Here in this paper, we presentmore » a study of trapped high order modes (HOMs) excited by a cw electron beam in the third-harmonic cavities of the LCLS-II linac. A detailed comparison of the original XFEL design and the LCLS-II design with a modified end group is performed in order to estimate the effect of a reduced beam pipe aperture on the efficiency of HOM damping. Furthermore, we apply a statistical analysis of the eigenmode spectrum for the estimation of the probability of resonant HOM losses and influence of HOMs on beam dynamics.« less

Resonant excitation of high order modes in the 3.9 GHz cavity of the Linac Coherent Light Source

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lunin, A.; Khabiboulline, T.; Solyak, N.; Sukhanov, A.; Yakovlev, V.

2018-02-01

Construction of the Linac Coherent Light Source II (LCLS-II) is underway for the world's first hard x-ray free-electron laser. A central part of the LCLS-II project is a 4 GeV superconducting radio frequency electron linac that will operate in the continuous wave (cw) mode. The linac is segmented into four sections named as L 0 , L 1 , L 2 , and L 3 . Two 3.9 GHz cryomodules, each housing of eight third-harmonic cavities similar to the cavities developed for the European X-ray Free Electron Laser (XFEL), will be used in section L 1 of the linac for linearizing the longitudinal beam profile. In this paper, we present a study of trapped high order modes (HOMs) excited by a cw electron beam in the third-harmonic cavities of the LCLS-II linac. A detailed comparison of the original XFEL design and the LCLS-II design with a modified end group is performed in order to estimate the effect of a reduced beam pipe aperture on the efficiency of HOM damping. Furthermore, we apply a statistical analysis of the eigenmode spectrum for the estimation of the probability of resonant HOM losses and influence of HOMs on beam dynamics.

Thermal-Mechanical Study of 3.9 GHz CW Coupler and Cavity for LCLS-II Project

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Gonin, Ivan; Harms, Elvin; Khabiboulline, Timergali

2017-05-01

Third harmonic system was originally developed by Fermilab for FLASH facility at DESY and then was adopted and modified by INFN for the XFEL project [1-3]. In contrast to XFEL project, all cryomodules in LCLS-II project will operate in CW regime with higher RF average power for 1.3 GHz and 3.9 GHz cavities and couplers. Design of the cavity and fundamental power coupler has been modified to satisfy LCLS-II requirements. In this paper we discuss the results of COMSOL thermal and mechanical analysis of the 3.9 GHz coupler and cavity to verify proposed modifica-tion of the design. For the dressedmore » cavity we present simulations of Lorentz force detuning, helium pressure sensitivity df/dP and major mechanical resonances.« less

A Model-Based Fast Protection System for High-Power RF Tube Amplifiers Used at the European XFEL Accelerator

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Butkowski, Łukasz; Vogel, Vladimir; Schlarb, Holger; Szabatin, Jerzy

2017-06-01

The driving engine of the superconducting accelerator of the European X-ray free electron laser (XFEL) is a set of 27 radio frequency (RF) stations. Each of the underground RF stations consists of a multibeam horizontal klystron that can provide up to 10 MW of power at 1.3 GHz. Klystrons are sensitive devices with a limited lifetime and a high mean time between failures. In real operation, the lifetime of the tube can be significantly reduced because of failures. The special fast protection klystron lifetime management (KLM) system has been developed to minimize the influence of service conditions on the lifetime of klystrons. The main task of this system is to detect all events which can destroy the tube as quickly as possible, and switch off the driving RF signal or the high voltage. Detection of events is based on a comparison of the value of the real signal obtained at the system output with the value estimated on the basis of a high-power RF amplifier model and input signals. The KLM system has been realized in field-programmable gate array (FPGA) and implemented in XFEL. Implementation is based on the standard low-level RF micro telecommunications computing architecture (MTCA.4 or xTCA). The main part of the paper focuses on an estimation of the klystron model and the implementation of KLM in FPGA. The results of the performance of the KLM system will also be presented.

X-ray spectrometer based on a bent diamond crystal for high repetition rate free-electron laser applications

DOE PAGES

Boesenberg, Ulrike; Samoylova, Liubov; Roth, Thomas; ...

2017-02-03

A precise spectral characterization of every single pulse is required in many x-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) experiments due to the fluctuating spectral content of self-amplified spontaneous emission (SASE) beams. Bent single-crystal spectrometers can provide sufficient spectral resolution to resolve the SASE spikes while also covering the full SASE bandwidth. To better withstand the high heat load induced by the 4.5 MHz repetition rate of pulses at the forthcoming European XFEL facility, a spectrometer based on single-crystal diamond has been developed. Here, we report a direct comparison of the diamond spectrometer with its Si counterpart in experiments performed at the Linacmore » Coherent Light Source.« less

Optical surface properties and their RF limitations of European XFEL cavities

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wenskat, Marc

2017-10-01

The inner surface of superconducting cavities plays a crucial role to achieve highest accelerating fields and low losses. The industrial fabrication of cavities for the European X-ray Free Electron Laser and the International Linear Collider HiGrade Research Project allowed for an investigation of this interplay. For the serial inspection of the inner surface, the optical inspection robot ’optical bench for automated cavity inspection with high resolution on short timescales’ OBACHT was constructed and to analyze the large amount of data, represented in the images of the inner surface, an image processing and analysis code was developed and new variables to describe the cavity surface were obtained. This quantitative analysis identified vendor-specific surface properties which allow the performance of quality control and assurance during production. In addition, a strong negative correlation of ρ =-0.93 with a significance of 6 σ of the integrated grain boundary area \\sum {A} versus the maximal achievable accelerating field {{E}}{acc,\\max } has been found.

Diagnostics Upgrades for Investigations of HOM Effects in TESLA-type SCRF Cavities

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Lumpkin, A. H.; Edstrom Jr., D.; Ruan, J.

We describe the upgrades to diagnostic capabilities on the Fermilab Accelerator Science and Technology (FAST) electron linear accelerator that will allow investigations of the effects of high-order modes (HOMs) in SCRF cavities on macropulse-average beam quality. We examine the dipole modes in the first pass-band generally observed in the 1.6-1.9 GHz regime for TESLA-type SCRF cavities due to uniform transverse beam offsets of the electron beam. Such cavities are the basis of the accelerators such as the European XFEL and the proposed MaRIE XFEL facility. Preliminary HOM detector data, prototype BPM test data, and first framing camera OTR data withmore » ~20- micron spatial resolution at 250 pC per bunch will be presented.« less

Roadmap of ultrafast x-ray atomic and molecular physics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Young, Linda; Ueda, Kiyoshi; Gühr, Markus; Bucksbaum, Philip H.; Simon, Marc; Mukamel, Shaul; Rohringer, Nina; Prince, Kevin C.; Masciovecchio, Claudio; Meyer, Michael; Rudenko, Artem; Rolles, Daniel; Bostedt, Christoph; Fuchs, Matthias; Reis, David A.; Santra, Robin; Kapteyn, Henry; Murnane, Margaret; Ibrahim, Heide; Légaré, François; Vrakking, Marc; Isinger, Marcus; Kroon, David; Gisselbrecht, Mathieu; L'Huillier, Anne; Wörner, Hans Jakob; Leone, Stephen R.

2018-02-01

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) and table-top sources of x-rays based upon high harmonic generation (HHG) have revolutionized the field of ultrafast x-ray atomic and molecular physics, largely due to an explosive growth in capabilities in the past decade. XFELs now provide unprecedented intensity (1020 W cm-2) of x-rays at wavelengths down to ˜1 Ångstrom, and HHG provides unprecedented time resolution (˜50 attoseconds) and a correspondingly large coherent bandwidth at longer wavelengths. For context, timescales can be referenced to the Bohr orbital period in hydrogen atom of 150 attoseconds and the hydrogen-molecule vibrational period of 8 femtoseconds; wavelength scales can be referenced to the chemically significant carbon K-edge at a photon energy of ˜280 eV (44 Ångstroms) and the bond length in methane of ˜1 Ångstrom. With these modern x-ray sources one now has the ability to focus on individual atoms, even when embedded in a complex molecule, and view electronic and nuclear motion on their intrinsic scales (attoseconds and Ångstroms). These sources have enabled coherent diffractive imaging, where one can image non-crystalline objects in three dimensions on ultrafast timescales, potentially with atomic resolution. The unprecedented intensity available with XFELs has opened new fields of multiphoton and nonlinear x-ray physics where behavior of matter under extreme conditions can be explored. The unprecedented time resolution and pulse synchronization provided by HHG sources has kindled fundamental investigations of time delays in photoionization, charge migration in molecules, and dynamics near conical intersections that are foundational to AMO physics and chemistry. This roadmap coincides with the year when three new XFEL facilities, operating at Ångstrom wavelengths, opened for users (European XFEL, Swiss-FEL and PAL-FEL in Korea) almost doubling the present worldwide number of XFELs, and documents the remarkable progress in HHG capabilities since its discovery roughly 30 years ago, showcasing experiments in AMO physics and other applications. Here we capture the perspectives of 17 leading groups and organize the contributions into four categories: ultrafast molecular dynamics, multidimensional x-ray spectroscopies; high-intensity x-ray phenomena; attosecond x-ray science.

Roadmap of ultrafast x-ray atomic and molecular physics

DOE PAGES

Young, Linda; Ueda, Kiyoshi; Gühr, Markus; ...

2018-01-09

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) and table-top sources of x-rays based upon high harmonic generation (HHG) have revolutionized the field of ultrafast x-ray atomic and molecular physics, largely due to an explosive growth in capabilities in the past decade. XFELs now provide unprecedented intensity (10 20 W cm -2) of x-rays at wavelengths down to ~1 Ångstrom, and HHG provides unprecedented time resolution (~50 attoseconds) and a correspondingly large coherent bandwidth at longer wavelengths. For context, timescales can be referenced to the Bohr orbital period in hydrogen atom of 150 attoseconds and the hydrogen-molecule vibrational period of 8 femtoseconds; wavelength scalesmore » can be referenced to the chemically significant carbon K-edge at a photon energy of ~280 eV (44 Ångstroms) and the bond length in methane of ~1 Ångstrom. With these modern x-ray sources one now has the ability to focus on individual atoms, even when embedded in a complex molecule, and view electronic and nuclear motion on their intrinsic scales (attoseconds and Ångstroms). These sources have enabled coherent diffractive imaging, where one can image non-crystalline objects in three dimensions on ultrafast timescales, potentially with atomic resolution. The unprecedented intensity available with XFELs has opened new fields of multiphoton and nonlinear x-ray physics where behavior of matter under extreme conditions can be explored. The unprecedented time resolution and pulse synchronization provided by HHG sources has kindled fundamental investigations of time delays in photoionization, charge migration in molecules, and dynamics near conical intersections that are foundational to AMO physics and chemistry. This roadmap coincides with the year when three new XFEL facilities, operating at Ångstrom wavelengths, opened for users (European XFEL, Swiss-FEL and PAL-FEL in Korea) almost doubling the present worldwide number of XFELs, and documents the remarkable progress in HHG capabilities since its discovery roughly 30 years ago, showcasing experiments in AMO physics and other applications. Here in this paper, we capture the perspectives of 17 leading groups and organize the contributions into four categories: ultrafast molecular dynamics, multidimensional x-ray spectroscopies; high-intensity x-ray phenomena; attosecond x-ray science.« less

Roadmap of ultrafast x-ray atomic and molecular physics

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Young, Linda; Ueda, Kiyoshi; Gühr, Markus

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) and table-top sources of x-rays based upon high harmonic generation (HHG) have revolutionized the field of ultrafast x-ray atomic and molecular physics, largely due to an explosive growth in capabilities in the past decade. XFELs now provide unprecedented intensity (10 20 W cm -2) of x-rays at wavelengths down to ~1 Ångstrom, and HHG provides unprecedented time resolution (~50 attoseconds) and a correspondingly large coherent bandwidth at longer wavelengths. For context, timescales can be referenced to the Bohr orbital period in hydrogen atom of 150 attoseconds and the hydrogen-molecule vibrational period of 8 femtoseconds; wavelength scalesmore » can be referenced to the chemically significant carbon K-edge at a photon energy of ~280 eV (44 Ångstroms) and the bond length in methane of ~1 Ångstrom. With these modern x-ray sources one now has the ability to focus on individual atoms, even when embedded in a complex molecule, and view electronic and nuclear motion on their intrinsic scales (attoseconds and Ångstroms). These sources have enabled coherent diffractive imaging, where one can image non-crystalline objects in three dimensions on ultrafast timescales, potentially with atomic resolution. The unprecedented intensity available with XFELs has opened new fields of multiphoton and nonlinear x-ray physics where behavior of matter under extreme conditions can be explored. The unprecedented time resolution and pulse synchronization provided by HHG sources has kindled fundamental investigations of time delays in photoionization, charge migration in molecules, and dynamics near conical intersections that are foundational to AMO physics and chemistry. This roadmap coincides with the year when three new XFEL facilities, operating at Ångstrom wavelengths, opened for users (European XFEL, Swiss-FEL and PAL-FEL in Korea) almost doubling the present worldwide number of XFELs, and documents the remarkable progress in HHG capabilities since its discovery roughly 30 years ago, showcasing experiments in AMO physics and other applications. Here in this paper, we capture the perspectives of 17 leading groups and organize the contributions into four categories: ultrafast molecular dynamics, multidimensional x-ray spectroscopies; high-intensity x-ray phenomena; attosecond x-ray science.« less

High-speed fixed-target serial virus crystallography

DOE PAGES

Roedig, Philip; Ginn, Helen M.; Pakendorf, Tim; ...

2017-06-19

Here, we report a method for serial X-ray crystallography at X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs), which allows for full use of the current 120-Hz repetition rate of the Linear Coherent Light Source (LCLS). Using a micropatterned silicon chip in combination with the high-speed Roadrunner goniometer for sample delivery, we were able to determine the crystal structures of the picornavirus bovine enterovirus 2 (BEV2) and the cytoplasmic polyhedrosis virus type 18 polyhedrin, with total data collection times of less than 14 and 10 min, respectively. Our method requires only micrograms of sample and should therefore broaden the applicability of serial femtosecond crystallographymore » to challenging projects for which only limited sample amounts are available. By synchronizing the sample exchange to the XFEL repetition rate, our method allows for most efficient use of the limited beam time available at XFELs and should enable a substantial increase in sample throughput at these facilities.« less

High-speed fixed-target serial virus crystallography

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Roedig, Philip; Ginn, Helen M.; Pakendorf, Tim

Here, we report a method for serial X-ray crystallography at X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs), which allows for full use of the current 120-Hz repetition rate of the Linear Coherent Light Source (LCLS). Using a micropatterned silicon chip in combination with the high-speed Roadrunner goniometer for sample delivery, we were able to determine the crystal structures of the picornavirus bovine enterovirus 2 (BEV2) and the cytoplasmic polyhedrosis virus type 18 polyhedrin, with total data collection times of less than 14 and 10 min, respectively. Our method requires only micrograms of sample and should therefore broaden the applicability of serial femtosecond crystallographymore » to challenging projects for which only limited sample amounts are available. By synchronizing the sample exchange to the XFEL repetition rate, our method allows for most efficient use of the limited beam time available at XFELs and should enable a substantial increase in sample throughput at these facilities.« less

High-speed fixed-target serial virus crystallography

PubMed Central

Roedig, Philip; Ginn, Helen M.; Pakendorf, Tim; Sutton, Geoff; Harlos, Karl; Walter, Thomas S.; Meyer, Jan; Fischer, Pontus; Duman, Ramona; Vartiainen, Ismo; Reime, Bernd; Warmer, Martin; Brewster, Aaron S.; Young, Iris D.; Michels-Clark, Tara; Sauter, Nicholas K.; Kotecha, Abhay; Kelly, James; Rowlands, David J.; Sikorsky, Marcin; Nelson, Silke; Damiani, Daniel S.; Alonso-Mori, Roberto; Ren, Jingshan; Fry, Elizabeth E.; David, Christian; Stuart, David I.; Wagner, Armin; Meents, Alke

2017-01-01

We report a method for serial X-ray crystallography at X-ray free electron lasers (XFELs), which allows for full use of the current 120 Hz repetition rate of the Linear Coherent Light Source (LCLS). Using a micro-patterned silicon chip in combination with the high-speed Roadrunner goniometer for sample delivery we were able to determine the crystal structures of a picornavirus, bovine enterovirus 2 (BEV2), and the cytoplasmic polyhedrosis virus type 18 polyhedrin. Total data collection times were less than 14 and 10 minutes, respectively. Our method requires only micrograms of sample and will therefore broaden the applicability of serial femtosecond crystallography to challenging projects for which only limited sample amounts are available. By synchronizing the sample exchange to the XFEL repetition rate, our method allows for the most efficient use of the limited beamtime available at XFELs and should enable a substantial increase in sample throughput at these facilities. PMID:28628129

Time-dependent wave front propagation simulation of a hard x-ray split-and-delay unit: Towards a measurement of the temporal coherence properties of x-ray free electron lasers

DOE PAGES

Roling, S.; Zacharias, H.; Samoylova, L.; ...

2014-11-18

For the European x-ray free electron laser (XFEL) a split-and-delay unit based on geometrical wavefront beam splitting and multilayer mirrors is built which covers the range of photon energies from 5 keV up to 20 keV. Maximum delays between Δτ = ±2.5 ps at hν=20 keV and up to Δτ = ±23 ps at hν = 5 keV will be possible. Time-dependent wave-optics simulations have been performed by means of Synchrotron Radiation Workshop software for XFEL pulses at hν = 5 keV. The XFEL radiation was simulated using results of time-dependent simulations applying the self-amplified spontaneous emission code FAST. Mainmore » features of the optical layout, including diffraction on the beam splitter edge and optics imperfections measured with a nanometer optic component measuring machine slope measuring profiler, were taken into account. The impact of these effects on the characterization of the temporal properties of XFEL pulses is analyzed. An approach based on fast Fourier transformation allows for the evaluation of the temporal coherence despite large wavefront distortions caused by the optics imperfections. In this manner, the fringes resulting from time-dependent two-beam interference can be filtered and evaluated yielding a coherence time of τ c = 0.187 fs (HWHM) for real, nonperfect mirrors, while for ideal mirrors a coherence time of τ c = 0.191 fs (HWHM) is expected.« less

Magnetic force study for the helical afterburner for the European XFEL

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Li, Peng; Wei, Tao; Li, Yuhui; Pflueger, Joachim

2017-05-01

At present the SASE3 undulator line at the European XFEL is using a planar undulator producing linear polarized soft Xray radiation only. In order to satisfy the demand for circular polarized radiation a helical undulator system, the so-called afterburner is in construction. It will be operated as a radiator using the pre-bunched beam of the SASE3 undulator system. Among several options for the magnetic structure the Apple-X geometry was chosen. This is a pure permanent magnet undulator using NdFeB material. Four magnet arrays are arranged symmetrically the beam axis. Polarization can be changed by adjusting the phase shift (PS) between the two orthogonal structures. The field strength can be adjusted either by gap adjustment or alternatively by the amplitude shift (AS) scheme. For an engineering design the maximum values of forces and torques on each of the components under worst case operational conditions are important. The superposition principle is used to reduce calculation time. It is found that the maximum forces Fx, Fy and Fz for a 2m long Apple-X undulator are 1.8*104N, 2.4*104N and 2.3*104N, respectively. More results are presented in this paper.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Shanks, Katherine S.; Philipp, Hugh T.; Weiss, Joel T.

Experiments at storage ring light sources as well as at next-generation light sources increasingly require detectors capable of high dynamic range operation, combining low-noise detection of single photons with large pixel well depth. XFEL sources in particular provide pulse intensities sufficiently high that a purely photon-counting approach is impractical. The High Dynamic Range Pixel Array Detector (HDR-PAD) project aims to provide a dynamic range extending from single-photon sensitivity to 10{sup 6} photons/pixel in a single XFEL pulse while maintaining the ability to tolerate a sustained flux of 10{sup 11} ph/s/pixel at a storage ring source. Achieving these goals involves themore » development of fast pixel front-end electronics as well as, in the XFEL case, leveraging the delayed charge collection due to plasma effects in the sensor. A first prototype of essential electronic components of the HDR-PAD readout ASIC, exploring different options for the pixel front-end, has been fabricated. Here, the HDR-PAD concept and preliminary design will be described.« less

LCLS-II Cryomodules Production at Fermilab

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Arkan, Tug; Grimm, Chuck; Kaluzny, Joshua

2017-05-01

LCLS-II is an upgrade project for the linear coherent light source (LCLS) at SLAC. The LCLS-II linac will consist of thirty-five 1.3 GHz and two 3.9 GHz superconducting RF continuous wave (CW) cryomodules that Fermilab and Jefferson Lab (JLab) will assemble in collaboration with SLAC. The LCLS-II 1.3 GHz cryomodule design is based on the European XFEL pulsed-mode cryomodule design with modifications needed for CW operation. Fermilab and JLab will each assemble and test a prototype 1.3 GHz cryomodule to assess the results of the CW modifications, in advance of 16 and 17 production 1.3 GHz cryomodules, respectively. Fermilab ismore » solely responsible for the 3.9 GHz cryomodules. After the prototype cryomodule tests are complete and lessons learned incorporated, both laboratories will increase their cryomodule production rates to meet the challenging LCLS-II project requirement of approximately one cryomodule per month per laboratory. This paper presents the Fermilab Cryomodule Assembly Facility (CAF) infrastructure for LCLS-II cryomodule production, the Fermilab prototype 1.3 GHz CW cryomodule (pCM) assembly and readiness for production assembly.« less

Start-to-end simulation of single-particle imaging using ultra-short pulses at the European X-ray Free-Electron Laser

DOE PAGES

Fortmann-Grote, Carsten; Buzmakov, Alexey; Jurek, Zoltan; ...

2017-09-01

Single-particle imaging with X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) has the potential to provide structural information at atomic resolution for non-crystalline biomolecules. This potential exists because ultra-short intense pulses can produce interpretable diffraction data notwithstanding radiation damage. This paper explores the impact of pulse duration on the interpretability of diffraction data using comprehensive and realistic simulations of an imaging experiment at the European X-ray Free-Electron Laser. In conclusion, it is found that the optimal pulse duration for molecules with a few thousand atoms at 5 keV lies between 3 and 9 fs.

Start-to-end simulation of single-particle imaging using ultra-short pulses at the European X-ray Free-Electron Laser

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Fortmann-Grote, Carsten; Buzmakov, Alexey; Jurek, Zoltan

Single-particle imaging with X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) has the potential to provide structural information at atomic resolution for non-crystalline biomolecules. This potential exists because ultra-short intense pulses can produce interpretable diffraction data notwithstanding radiation damage. This paper explores the impact of pulse duration on the interpretability of diffraction data using comprehensive and realistic simulations of an imaging experiment at the European X-ray Free-Electron Laser. In conclusion, it is found that the optimal pulse duration for molecules with a few thousand atoms at 5 keV lies between 3 and 9 fs.

Characterization of a piezo bendable X-ray mirror.

PubMed

Vannoni, Maurizio; Freijo Martín, Idoia; Siewert, Frank; Signorato, Riccardo; Yang, Fan; Sinn, Harald

2016-01-01

A full-scale piezo bendable mirror built as a prototype for an offset mirror at the European XFEL is characterized. The piezo ceramic elements are glued onto the mirror substrate, side-face on with respect to the reflecting surface. Using a nanometre optical component measuring machine and a large-aperture Fizeau interferometer, the mirror profile and influence functions were characterized, and further analysis was made to investigate the junction effect, hysteresis, twisting and reproducibility.

Focusing X-ray free-electron laser pulses using Kirkpatrick-Baez mirrors at the NCI hutch of the PAL-XFEL.

PubMed

Kim, Jangwoo; Kim, Hyo Yun; Park, Jaehyun; Kim, Sangsoo; Kim, Sunam; Rah, Seungyu; Lim, Jun; Nam, Ki Hyun

2018-01-01

The Pohang Accelerator Laboratory X-ray Free-Electron Laser (PAL-XFEL) is a recently commissioned X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) facility that provides intense ultrashort X-ray pulses based on the self-amplified spontaneous emission process. The nano-crystallography and coherent imaging (NCI) hutch with forward-scattering geometry is located at the hard X-ray beamline of the PAL-XFEL and provides opportunities to perform serial femtosecond crystallography and coherent X-ray diffraction imaging. To produce intense high-density XFEL pulses at the interaction positions between the X-rays and various samples, a microfocusing Kirkpatrick-Baez (KB) mirror system that includes an ultra-precision manipulator has been developed. In this paper, the design of a KB mirror system that focuses the hard XFEL beam onto a fixed sample point of the NCI hutch, which is positioned along the hard XFEL beamline, is described. The focusing system produces a two-dimensional focusing beam at approximately 2 µm scale across the 2-11 keV photon energy range. XFEL pulses of 9.7 keV energy were successfully focused onto an area of size 1.94 µm × 2.08 µm FWHM.

Detuning related coupler kick variation of a superconducting nine-cell 1.3 GHz cavity

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hellert, Thorsten; Dohlus, Martin

2018-04-01

Superconducting TESLA-type cavities are widely used to accelerate electrons in long bunch trains, such as in high repetition rate free electron lasers. The TESLA cavity is equipped with two higher order mode couplers and a fundamental power coupler (FPC), which break the axial symmetry of the cavity. The passing electrons therefore experience axially asymmetrical coupler kicks, which depend on the transverse beam position at the couplers and the rf phase. The resulting emittance dilution has been studied in detail in the literature. However, the kick induced by the FPC depends explicitly on the ratio of the forward to the backward traveling waves at the coupler, which has received little attention. The intention of this paper is to present the concept of discrete coupler kicks with a novel approach of separating the field disturbances related to the standing wave and a reflection dependent part. Particular attention is directed to the role of the penetration depth of the FPC antenna, which determines the loaded quality factor of the cavity. The developed beam transport model is compared to dedicated experiments at FLASH and European XFEL. Both the observed transverse coupling and detuning related coupler kick variations are in good agreement with the model. Finally, the expected trajectory variations due to coupler kick variations at European XFEL are investigated and results of numerical studies are presented.

Start-to-end simulation of single-particle imaging using ultra-short pulses at the European X-ray Free-Electron Laser

PubMed Central

Buzmakov, Alexey; Jurek, Zoltan; Loh, Ne-Te Duane; Samoylova, Liubov; Santra, Robin; Schneidmiller, Evgeny A.; Tschentscher, Thomas; Yakubov, Sergey; Yoon, Chun Hong; Yurkov, Michael V.; Ziaja-Motyka, Beata; Mancuso, Adrian P.

2017-01-01

Single-particle imaging with X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) has the potential to provide structural information at atomic resolution for non-crystalline biomolecules. This potential exists because ultra-short intense pulses can produce interpretable diffraction data notwithstanding radiation damage. This paper explores the impact of pulse duration on the interpretability of diffraction data using comprehensive and realistic simulations of an imaging experiment at the European X-ray Free-Electron Laser. It is found that the optimal pulse duration for molecules with a few thousand atoms at 5 keV lies between 3 and 9 fs. PMID:28989713

Automated optical inspection and image analysis of superconducting radio-frequency cavities

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wenskat, M.

2017-05-01

The inner surface of superconducting cavities plays a crucial role to achieve highest accelerating fields and low losses. For an investigation of this inner surface of more than 100 cavities within the cavity fabrication for the European XFEL and the ILC HiGrade Research Project, an optical inspection robot OBACHT was constructed. To analyze up to 2325 images per cavity, an image processing and analysis code was developed and new variables to describe the cavity surface were obtained. The accuracy of this code is up to 97 % and the positive predictive value (PPV) 99 % within the resolution of 15.63 μm. The optical obtained surface roughness is in agreement with standard profilometric methods. The image analysis algorithm identified and quantified vendor specific fabrication properties as the electron beam welding speed and the different surface roughness due to the different chemical treatments. In addition, a correlation of ρ = -0.93 with a significance of 6 σ between an obtained surface variable and the maximal accelerating field was found.

Enabling X-ray free electron laser crystallography for challenging biological systems from a limited number of crystals

DOE PAGES

Uervirojnangkoorn, Monarin; Zeldin, Oliver B.; Lyubimov, Artem Y.; ...

2015-03-17

There is considerable potential for X-ray free electron lasers (XFELs) to enable determination of macromolecular crystal structures that are difficult to solve using current synchrotron sources. Prior XFEL studies often involved the collection of thousands to millions of diffraction images, in part due to limitations of data processing methods. We implemented a data processing system based on classical post-refinement techniques, adapted to specific properties of XFEL diffraction data. When applied to XFEL data from three different proteins collected using various sample delivery systems and XFEL beam parameters, our method improved the quality of the diffraction data as well as themore » resulting refined atomic models and electron density maps. Moreover, the number of observations for a reflection necessary to assemble an accurate data set could be reduced to a few observations. In conclusion, these developments will help expand the applicability of XFEL crystallography to challenging biological systems, including cases where sample is limited.« less

Enabling X-ray free electron laser crystallography for challenging biological systems from a limited number of crystals

DOE PAGES

Uervirojnangkoorn, Monarin; Zeldin, Oliver B.; Lyubimov, Artem Y.; ...

2015-03-17

There is considerable potential for X-ray free electron lasers (XFELs) to enable determination of macromolecular crystal structures that are difficult to solve using current synchrotron sources. Prior XFEL studies often involved the collection of thousands to millions of diffraction images, in part due to limitations of data processing methods. We implemented a data processing system based on classical post-refinement techniques, adapted to specific properties of XFEL diffraction data. When applied to XFEL data from three different proteins collected using various sample delivery systems and XFEL beam parameters, our method improved the quality of the diffraction data as well as themore » resulting refined atomic models and electron density maps. Moreover, the number of observations for a reflection necessary to assemble an accurate data set could be reduced to a few observations. These developments will help expand the applicability of XFEL crystallography to challenging biological systems, including cases where sample is limited.« less

Enabling X-ray free electron laser crystallography for challenging biological systems from a limited number of crystals

PubMed Central

Uervirojnangkoorn, Monarin; Zeldin, Oliver B; Lyubimov, Artem Y; Hattne, Johan; Brewster, Aaron S; Sauter, Nicholas K; Brunger, Axel T; Weis, William I

2015-01-01

There is considerable potential for X-ray free electron lasers (XFELs) to enable determination of macromolecular crystal structures that are difficult to solve using current synchrotron sources. Prior XFEL studies often involved the collection of thousands to millions of diffraction images, in part due to limitations of data processing methods. We implemented a data processing system based on classical post-refinement techniques, adapted to specific properties of XFEL diffraction data. When applied to XFEL data from three different proteins collected using various sample delivery systems and XFEL beam parameters, our method improved the quality of the diffraction data as well as the resulting refined atomic models and electron density maps. Moreover, the number of observations for a reflection necessary to assemble an accurate data set could be reduced to a few observations. These developments will help expand the applicability of XFEL crystallography to challenging biological systems, including cases where sample is limited. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.05421.001 PMID:25781634

MaRIE Undulator & XFEL Systems

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Nguyen, Dinh Cong; Marksteiner, Quinn R.; Anisimov, Petr Mikhaylovich

The 22 slides in this presentation treat the subject under the following headings: MaRIE XFEL Performance Parameters, Input Electron Beam Parameters, Undulator Design, Genesis Simulations, Risks, and Summary It is concluded that time-dependent Genesis simulations show the MaRIE XFEL can deliver the number of photons within the required bandwidth, provided a number of assumptions are met; the highest risks are associated with the electron beam driving the XFEL undulator; and risks associated with the undulator and/or distributed seeding technique may be evaluated or retired by performing early validation experiments.

Performance evaluation of the analogue front-end and ADC prototypes for the Gotthard-II development

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhang, J.; Andrä, M.; Barten, R.; Bergamaschi, A.; Brückner, M.; Dinapoli, R.; Fröjdh, E.; Greiffenberg, D.; Lopez-Cuenca, C.; Mezza, D.; Mozzanica, A.; Ramilli, M.; Redford, S.; Ruat, M.; Ruder, C.; Schmitt, B.; Shi, X.; Thattil, D.; Tinti, G.; Turcato, M.; Vetter, S.

2017-12-01

Gotthard-II is a silicon microstrip detector developed for the European X-ray Free-Electron Laser (XFEL.EU). Its potential scientific applications include X-ray absorption/emission spectroscopy, hard X-ray high resolution single-shot spectrometry (HiREX), energy dispersive experiments at 4.5 MHz frame rate, beam diagnostics, as well as veto signal generation for pixel detectors. Gotthard-II uses a silicon microstrip sensor with a pitch of 50 μm or 25 μm and with 1280 or 2560 channels wire-bonded to readout chips (ROCs). In the ROC, an adaptive gain switching pre-amplifier (PRE), a fully differential Correlated-Double-Sampling (CDS) stage, an Analog-to-Digital Converter (ADC) as well as a Static Random-Access Memory (SRAM) capable of storing all the 2700 images in an XFEL.EU bunch train will be implemented. Several prototypes with different designs of the analogue front-end (PRE and CDS) and ADC test structures have been fabricated in UMC-110 nm CMOS technology and their performance has been evaluated. In this paper, the performance of the analogue front-end and ADC will be summarized.

Nanometer-scale characterization of laser-driven plasmas, compression, shocks and phase transitions, by coherent small angle x-ray scattering

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kluge, Thomas

2015-11-01

Combining ultra-intense short-pulse and high-energy long-pulse lasers, with brilliant coherent hard X-ray FELs, such as the Helmholtz International Beamline for Extreme Fields (HIBEF) under construction at the HED Instrument of European XFEL, or MEC at LCLS, holds the promise to revolutionize our understanding of many High Energy Density Physics phenomena. Examples include the relativistic electron generation, transport, and bulk plasma response, and ionization dynamics and heating in relativistic laser-matter interactions, or the dynamics of laser-driven shocks, quasi-isentropic compression, and the kinetics of phase transitions at high pressure. A particularly promising new technique is the use of coherent X-ray diffraction to characterize electron density correlations, and by resonant scattering to characterize the distribution of specific charge-state ions, either on the ultrafast time scale of the laser interaction, or associated with hydrodynamic motion. As well one can image slight density changes arising from phase transitions inside of shock-compressed high pressure matter. The feasibility of coherent diffraction techniques in laser-driven matter will be discussed. including recent results from demonstration experiments at MEC. Among other things, very sharp density changes from laser-driven compression are observed, having an effective step width of 10 nm or smaller. This compares to a resolution of several hundred nm achievedpreviously with phase contrast imaging. and on behalf of HIBEF User Consortium, for the Helmholtz International Beamline for Extreme Fields at the European XFEL.

Serial femtosecond crystallography at the SACLA: breakthrough to dynamic structural biology.

PubMed

Mizohata, Eiichi; Nakane, Takanori; Fukuda, Yohta; Nango, Eriko; Iwata, So

2018-04-01

X-ray crystallography visualizes the world at the atomic level. It has been used as the most powerful technique for observing the three-dimensional structures of biological macromolecules and has pioneered structural biology. To determine a crystal structure with high resolution, it was traditionally required to prepare large crystals (> 200 μm). Later, synchrotron radiation facilities, such as SPring-8, that produce powerful X-rays were built. They enabled users to obtain good quality X-ray diffraction images even with smaller crystals (ca. 200-50 μm). In recent years, one of the most important technological innovations in structural biology has been the development of X-ray free electron lasers (XFELs). The SPring-8 Angstrom Compact free electron LAser (SACLA) in Japan generates the XFEL beam by accelerating electrons to relativistic speeds and directing them through in-vacuum, short-period undulators. Since user operation started in 2012, we have been involved in the development of serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) measurement systems using XFEL at the SACLA. The SACLA generates X-rays a billion times brighter than SPring-8. The extremely bright XFEL pulses enable data collection with microcrystals (ca. 50-1 μm). Although many molecular analysis techniques exist, SFX is the only technique that can visualize radiation-damage-free structures of biological macromolecules at room temperature in atomic resolution and fast time resolution. Here, we review the achievements of the SACLA-SFX Project in the past 5 years. In particular, we focus on: (1) the measurement system for SFX; (2) experimental phasing by SFX; (3) enzyme chemistry based on damage-free room-temperature structures; and (4) molecular movie taken by time-resolved SFX.

A Bright Future for Serial Femtosecond Crystallography with XFELs.

PubMed

Johansson, Linda C; Stauch, Benjamin; Ishchenko, Andrii; Cherezov, Vadim

2017-09-01

X-ray free electron lasers (XFELs) have the potential to revolutionize macromolecular structural biology due to the unique combination of spatial coherence, extreme peak brilliance, and short duration of X-ray pulses. A recently emerged serial femtosecond (fs) crystallography (SFX) approach using XFEL radiation overcomes some of the biggest hurdles of traditional crystallography related to radiation damage through the diffraction-before-destruction principle. Intense fs XFEL pulses enable high-resolution room-temperature structure determination of difficult-to-crystallize biological macromolecules, while simultaneously opening a new era of time-resolved structural studies. Here, we review the latest developments in instrumentation, sample delivery, data analysis, crystallization methods, and applications of SFX to important biological questions, and conclude with brief insights into the bright future of structural biology using XFELs. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Development of a High Dynamic Range Pixel Array Detector for Synchrotrons and XFELs

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Weiss, Joel Todd

Advances in synchrotron radiation light source technology have opened new lines of inquiry in material science, biology, and everything in between. However, x-ray detector capabilities must advance in concert with light source technology to fully realize experimental possibilities. X-ray free electron lasers (XFELs) place particularly large demands on the capabilities of detectors, and developments towards diffraction-limited storage ring sources also necessitate detectors capable of measuring very high flux [1-3]. The detector described herein builds on the Mixed Mode Pixel Array Detector (MM-PAD) framework, developed previously by our group to perform high dynamic range imaging, and the Adaptive Gain Integrating Pixel Detector (AGIPD) developed for the European XFEL by a collaboration between Deustsches Elektronen-Synchrotron (DESY), the Paul-Scherrer-Institute (PSI), the University of Hamburg, and the University of Bonn, led by Heinz Graafsma [4, 5]. The feasibility of combining adaptive gain with charge removal techniques to increase dynamic range in XFEL experiments is assessed by simulating XFEL scatter with a pulsed infrared laser. The strategy is incorporated into pixel prototypes which are evaluated with direct current injection to simulate very high incident x-ray flux. A fully functional 16x16 pixel hybrid integrating x-ray detector featuring several different pixel architectures based on the prototypes was developed. This dissertation describes its operation and characterization. To extend dynamic range, charge is removed from the integration node of the front-end amplifier without interrupting integration. The number of times this process occurs is recorded by a digital counter in the pixel. The parameter limiting full well is thereby shifted from the size of an integration capacitor to the depth of a digital counter. The result is similar to that achieved by counting pixel array detectors, but the integrators presented here are designed to tolerate a sustained flux >1011 x-rays/pixel/second. In addition, digitization of residual analog signals allows sensitivity for single x-rays or low flux signals. Pixel high flux linearity is evaluated by direct exposure to an unattenuated synchrotron source x-ray beam and flux measurements of more than 1010 9.52 keV x-rays/pixel/s are made. Detector sensitivity to small signals is evaluated and dominant sources of error are identified. These new pixels boast multiple orders of magnitude improvement in maximum sustained flux over the MM-PAD, which is capable of measuring a sustained flux in excess of 108 x-rays/pixel/second while maintaining sensitivity to smaller signals, down to single x-rays.

X-ray laser diffraction for structure determination of the rhodopsin-arrestin complex

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhou, X. Edward; Gao, Xiang; Barty, Anton; Kang, Yanyong; He, Yuanzheng; Liu, Wei; Ishchenko, Andrii; White, Thomas A.; Yefanov, Oleksandr; Han, Gye Won; Xu, Qingping; de Waal, Parker W.; Suino-Powell, Kelly M.; Boutet, Sébastien; Williams, Garth J.; Wang, Meitian; Li, Dianfan; Caffrey, Martin; Chapman, Henry N.; Spence, John C. H.; Fromme, Petra; Weierstall, Uwe; Stevens, Raymond C.; Cherezov, Vadim; Melcher, Karsten; Xu, H. Eric

2016-04-01

Serial femtosecond X-ray crystallography (SFX) using an X-ray free electron laser (XFEL) is a recent advancement in structural biology for solving crystal structures of challenging membrane proteins, including G-protein coupled receptors (GPCRs), which often only produce microcrystals. An XFEL delivers highly intense X-ray pulses of femtosecond duration short enough to enable the collection of single diffraction images before significant radiation damage to crystals sets in. Here we report the deposition of the XFEL data and provide further details on crystallization, XFEL data collection and analysis, structure determination, and the validation of the structural model. The rhodopsin-arrestin crystal structure solved with SFX represents the first near-atomic resolution structure of a GPCR-arrestin complex, provides structural insights into understanding of arrestin-mediated GPCR signaling, and demonstrates the great potential of this SFX-XFEL technology for accelerating crystal structure determination of challenging proteins and protein complexes.

X-ray laser diffraction for structure determination of the rhodopsin-arrestin complex.

PubMed

Zhou, X Edward; Gao, Xiang; Barty, Anton; Kang, Yanyong; He, Yuanzheng; Liu, Wei; Ishchenko, Andrii; White, Thomas A; Yefanov, Oleksandr; Han, Gye Won; Xu, Qingping; de Waal, Parker W; Suino-Powell, Kelly M; Boutet, Sébastien; Williams, Garth J; Wang, Meitian; Li, Dianfan; Caffrey, Martin; Chapman, Henry N; Spence, John C H; Fromme, Petra; Weierstall, Uwe; Stevens, Raymond C; Cherezov, Vadim; Melcher, Karsten; Xu, H Eric

2016-04-12

Serial femtosecond X-ray crystallography (SFX) using an X-ray free electron laser (XFEL) is a recent advancement in structural biology for solving crystal structures of challenging membrane proteins, including G-protein coupled receptors (GPCRs), which often only produce microcrystals. An XFEL delivers highly intense X-ray pulses of femtosecond duration short enough to enable the collection of single diffraction images before significant radiation damage to crystals sets in. Here we report the deposition of the XFEL data and provide further details on crystallization, XFEL data collection and analysis, structure determination, and the validation of the structural model. The rhodopsin-arrestin crystal structure solved with SFX represents the first near-atomic resolution structure of a GPCR-arrestin complex, provides structural insights into understanding of arrestin-mediated GPCR signaling, and demonstrates the great potential of this SFX-XFEL technology for accelerating crystal structure determination of challenging proteins and protein complexes.

X-ray laser diffraction for structure determination of the rhodopsin-arrestin complex

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Zhou, X. Edward; Gao, Xiang; Barty, Anton

Here, serial femtosecond X-ray crystallography (SFX) using an X-ray free electron laser (XFEL) is a recent advancement in structural biology for solving crystal structures of challenging membrane proteins, including G-protein coupled receptors (GPCRs), which often only produce microcrystals. An XFEL delivers highly intense X-ray pulses of femtosecond duration short enough to enable the collection of single diffraction images before significant radiation damage to crystals sets in. Here we report the deposition of the XFEL data and provide further details on crystallization, XFEL data collection and analysis, structure determination, and the validation of the structural model. The rhodopsin-arrestin crystal structure solvedmore » with SFX represents the first near-atomic resolution structure of a GPCR-arrestin complex, provides structural insights into understanding of arrestin-mediated GPCR signaling, and demonstrates the great potential of this SFX-XFEL technology for accelerating crystal structure determination of challenging proteins and protein complexes.« less

X-ray laser diffraction for structure determination of the rhodopsin-arrestin complex

PubMed Central

Zhou, X. Edward; Gao, Xiang; Barty, Anton; Kang, Yanyong; He, Yuanzheng; Liu, Wei; Ishchenko, Andrii; White, Thomas A.; Yefanov, Oleksandr; Han, Gye Won; Xu, Qingping; de Waal, Parker W.; Suino-Powell, Kelly M.; Boutet, Sébastien; Williams, Garth J.; Wang, Meitian; Li, Dianfan; Caffrey, Martin; Chapman, Henry N.; Spence, John C.H.; Fromme, Petra; Weierstall, Uwe; Stevens, Raymond C.; Cherezov, Vadim; Melcher, Karsten; Xu, H. Eric

2016-01-01

Serial femtosecond X-ray crystallography (SFX) using an X-ray free electron laser (XFEL) is a recent advancement in structural biology for solving crystal structures of challenging membrane proteins, including G-protein coupled receptors (GPCRs), which often only produce microcrystals. An XFEL delivers highly intense X-ray pulses of femtosecond duration short enough to enable the collection of single diffraction images before significant radiation damage to crystals sets in. Here we report the deposition of the XFEL data and provide further details on crystallization, XFEL data collection and analysis, structure determination, and the validation of the structural model. The rhodopsin-arrestin crystal structure solved with SFX represents the first near-atomic resolution structure of a GPCR-arrestin complex, provides structural insights into understanding of arrestin-mediated GPCR signaling, and demonstrates the great potential of this SFX-XFEL technology for accelerating crystal structure determination of challenging proteins and protein complexes. PMID:27070998

X-ray laser diffraction for structure determination of the rhodopsin-arrestin complex

DOE PAGES

Zhou, X. Edward; Gao, Xiang; Barty, Anton; ...

2016-04-12

Here, serial femtosecond X-ray crystallography (SFX) using an X-ray free electron laser (XFEL) is a recent advancement in structural biology for solving crystal structures of challenging membrane proteins, including G-protein coupled receptors (GPCRs), which often only produce microcrystals. An XFEL delivers highly intense X-ray pulses of femtosecond duration short enough to enable the collection of single diffraction images before significant radiation damage to crystals sets in. Here we report the deposition of the XFEL data and provide further details on crystallization, XFEL data collection and analysis, structure determination, and the validation of the structural model. The rhodopsin-arrestin crystal structure solvedmore » with SFX represents the first near-atomic resolution structure of a GPCR-arrestin complex, provides structural insights into understanding of arrestin-mediated GPCR signaling, and demonstrates the great potential of this SFX-XFEL technology for accelerating crystal structure determination of challenging proteins and protein complexes.« less

Redesign of the End Group in the 3.9 GHz LCLS-II Cavity

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Lunin, Andrei; Gonin, Ivan; Khabiboulline, Timergali

Development and production of Linac Coherent Light Source II (LCLS-II) is underway. The central part of LCLS-II is a continuous wave superconducting RF (CW SCRF) electron linac. The 3.9 GHz third harmonic cavity similar to the XFEL design will be used in LCLS-II for linearizing the longitudinal beam profile*. The initial design of the 3.9 GHz cavity developed for XFEL project has a large, 40 mm, beam pipe aperture for better higher-order mode (HOM) damping. It is resulted in dipole HOMs with frequencies nearby the operating mode, which causes difficulties with HOM coupler notch filter tuning. The CW linac operationmore » requires an extra caution in the design of the HOM coupler in order to prevent its possible overheating. In this paper we present the modified 3.9 GHz cavity End Group for meeting the LCLS-II requirements« less

A split-beam probe-pump-probe scheme for femtosecond time resolved protein X-ray crystallography

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

van Thor, Jasper J.; Madsen, Anders

In order to exploit the femtosecond pulse duration of X-ray Free-Electron Lasers (XFEL) operating in the hard X-ray regime for ultrafast time-resolved protein crystallography experiments, critical parameters that determine the crystallographic signal-to-noise (I/σI) must be addressed. For single-crystal studies under low absorbed dose conditions, it has been shown that the intrinsic pulse intensity stability as well as mode structure and jitter of this structure, significantly affect the crystallographic signal-to-noise. Here, geometrical parameters are theoretically explored for a three-beam scheme: X-ray probe, optical pump, X-ray probe (or “probe-pump-probe”) which will allow experimental determination of the photo-induced structure factor amplitude differences, ΔF,more » in a ratiometric manner, thereby internally referencing the intensity noise of the XFEL source. In addition to a non-collinear split-beam geometry which separates un-pumped and pumped diffraction patterns on an area detector, applying an additional convergence angle to both beams by focusing leads to integration over mosaic blocks in the case of well-ordered stationary protein crystals. Ray-tracing X-ray diffraction simulations are performed for an example using photoactive yellow protein crystals in order to explore the geometrical design parameters which would be needed. The specifications for an X-ray split and delay instrument that implements both an offset angle and focused beams are discussed, for implementation of a probe-pump-probe scheme at the European XFEL. We discuss possible extension of single crystal studies to serial femtosecond crystallography, particularly in view of the expected X-ray damage and ablation due to the first probe pulse.« less

A split-beam probe-pump-probe scheme for femtosecond time resolved protein X-ray crystallography

DOE PAGES

van Thor, Jasper J.; Madsen, Anders

2015-01-01

In order to exploit the femtosecond pulse duration of X-ray Free-Electron Lasers (XFEL) operating in the hard X-ray regime for ultrafast time-resolved protein crystallography experiments, critical parameters that determine the crystallographic signal-to-noise (I/σI) must be addressed. For single-crystal studies under low absorbed dose conditions, it has been shown that the intrinsic pulse intensity stability as well as mode structure and jitter of this structure, significantly affect the crystallographic signal-to-noise. Here, geometrical parameters are theoretically explored for a three-beam scheme: X-ray probe, optical pump, X-ray probe (or “probe-pump-probe”) which will allow experimental determination of the photo-induced structure factor amplitude differences, ΔF,more » in a ratiometric manner, thereby internally referencing the intensity noise of the XFEL source. In addition to a non-collinear split-beam geometry which separates un-pumped and pumped diffraction patterns on an area detector, applying an additional convergence angle to both beams by focusing leads to integration over mosaic blocks in the case of well-ordered stationary protein crystals. Ray-tracing X-ray diffraction simulations are performed for an example using photoactive yellow protein crystals in order to explore the geometrical design parameters which would be needed. The specifications for an X-ray split and delay instrument that implements both an offset angle and focused beams are discussed, for implementation of a probe-pump-probe scheme at the European XFEL. We discuss possible extension of single crystal studies to serial femtosecond crystallography, particularly in view of the expected X-ray damage and ablation due to the first probe pulse.« less

A split-beam probe-pump-probe scheme for femtosecond time resolved protein X-ray crystallography

PubMed Central

van Thor, Jasper J.; Madsen, Anders

2015-01-01

In order to exploit the femtosecond pulse duration of X-ray Free-Electron Lasers (XFEL) operating in the hard X-ray regime for ultrafast time-resolved protein crystallography experiments, critical parameters that determine the crystallographic signal-to-noise (I/σI) must be addressed. For single-crystal studies under low absorbed dose conditions, it has been shown that the intrinsic pulse intensity stability as well as mode structure and jitter of this structure, significantly affect the crystallographic signal-to-noise. Here, geometrical parameters are theoretically explored for a three-beam scheme: X-ray probe, optical pump, X-ray probe (or “probe-pump-probe”) which will allow experimental determination of the photo-induced structure factor amplitude differences, ΔF, in a ratiometric manner, thereby internally referencing the intensity noise of the XFEL source. In addition to a non-collinear split-beam geometry which separates un-pumped and pumped diffraction patterns on an area detector, applying an additional convergence angle to both beams by focusing leads to integration over mosaic blocks in the case of well-ordered stationary protein crystals. Ray-tracing X-ray diffraction simulations are performed for an example using photoactive yellow protein crystals in order to explore the geometrical design parameters which would be needed. The specifications for an X-ray split and delay instrument that implements both an offset angle and focused beams are discussed, for implementation of a probe-pump-probe scheme at the European XFEL. We discuss possible extension of single crystal studies to serial femtosecond crystallography, particularly in view of the expected X-ray damage and ablation due to the first probe pulse. PMID:26798786

Does one need a 4.5 K screen in cryostats of superconducting accelerator devices operating in superfluid helium? lessons from the LHL

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lebrun, Philippe; Parma, Vittorio; Tavian, Laurent

2014-01-01

Superfluid helium is increasingly used as a coolant for superconducting devices in particle accelerators: the lower temperature enhances the performance of superconductors in high-field magnets and reduces BCS losses in RF acceleration cavities, while the excellent transport properties of superfluid helium can be put to work in efficient distributed cooling systems. The thermodynamic penalty of operating at lower temperature however requires careful management of the heat loads, achieved inter alia through proper design and construction of the cryostats. A recurrent question appears to be that of the need and practical feasibility of an additional screen cooled by normal helium at around 4.5 K surrounding the cold mass at about 2 K, in such cryostats equipped with a standard 80 K screen. We introduce the issue in terms of first principles applied to the configuration of the cryostats, discuss technical constraints and economical limitations, and illustrate the argumentation with examples taken from large projects confronted with this issue, i.e. CEBAF, SPL, ESS, LHC, TESLA, European X-FEL, ILC.

Structure of CPV17 polyhedrin determined by the improved analysis of serial femtosecond crystallographic data

DOE PAGES

Ginn, Helen M.; Messerschmidt, Marc; Ji, Xiaoyun; ...

2015-03-09

The X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) allows the analysis of small weakly diffracting protein crystals, but has required very many crystals to obtain good data. Here we use an XFEL to determine the room temperature atomic structure for the smallest cytoplasmic polyhedrosis virus polyhedra yet characterized, which we failed to solve at a synchrotron. These protein microcrystals, roughly a micron across, accrue within infected cells. We use a new physical model for XFEL diffraction, which better estimates the experimental signal, delivering a high-resolution XFEL structure (1.75 Å), using fewer crystals than previously required for this resolution. The crystal lattice and proteinmore » core are conserved compared with a polyhedrin with less than 10% sequence identity. We explain how the conserved biological phenotype, the crystal lattice, is maintained in the face of extreme environmental challenge and massive evolutionary divergence. Our improved methods should open up more challenging biological samples to XFEL analysis.« less

Diffraction based Hanbury Brown and Twiss interferometry at a hard x-ray free-electron laser

DOE PAGES

Gorobtsov, O. Yu.; Mukharamova, N.; Lazarev, S.; ...

2018-02-02

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) provide extremely bright and highly spatially coherent x-ray radiation with femtosecond pulse duration. Currently, they are widely used in biology and material science. Knowledge of the XFEL statistical properties during an experiment may be vitally important for the accurate interpretation of the results. Here, for the first time, we demonstrate Hanbury Brown and Twiss (HBT) interferometry performed in diffraction mode at an XFEL source. It allowed us to determine the XFEL statistical properties directly from the Bragg peaks originating from colloidal crystals. This approach is different from the traditional one when HBT interferometry is performed inmore » the direct beam without a sample. Our analysis has demonstrated nearly full (80%) global spatial coherence of the XFEL pulses and an average pulse duration on the order of ten femtoseconds for the monochromatized beam, which is significantly shorter than expected from the electron bunch measurements.« less

Diffraction based Hanbury Brown and Twiss interferometry at a hard x-ray free-electron laser

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Gorobtsov, O. Yu.; Mukharamova, N.; Lazarev, S.

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) provide extremely bright and highly spatially coherent x-ray radiation with femtosecond pulse duration. Currently, they are widely used in biology and material science. Knowledge of the XFEL statistical properties during an experiment may be vitally important for the accurate interpretation of the results. Here, for the first time, we demonstrate Hanbury Brown and Twiss (HBT) interferometry performed in diffraction mode at an XFEL source. It allowed us to determine the XFEL statistical properties directly from the Bragg peaks originating from colloidal crystals. This approach is different from the traditional one when HBT interferometry is performed inmore » the direct beam without a sample. Our analysis has demonstrated nearly full (80%) global spatial coherence of the XFEL pulses and an average pulse duration on the order of ten femtoseconds for the monochromatized beam, which is significantly shorter than expected from the electron bunch measurements.« less

Low dose radiation damage effects in silicon strip detectors

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wiącek, P.; Dąbrowski, W.

2016-11-01

The radiation damage effects in silicon segmented detectors caused by X-rays have become recently an important research topic driven mainly by development of new detectors for applications at the European X-ray Free Electron Laser (E-XFEL). However, radiation damage in silicon strip is observed not only after extreme doses up to 1 GGy expected at E-XFEL, but also at doses in the range of tens of Gy, to which the detectors in laboratory instruments like X-ray diffractometers or X-ray spectrometers can be exposed. In this paper we report on investigation of radiation damage effects in a custom developed silicon strip detector used in laboratory diffractometers equipped with X-ray tubes. Our results show that significant degradation of detector performance occurs at low doses, well below 200 Gy, which can be reached during normal operation of laboratory instruments. Degradation of the detector energy resolution can be explained by increasing leakage current and increasing interstrip capacitance of the sensor. Another observed effect caused by accumulation of charge trapped in the surface oxide layer is change of charge division between adjacent strips. In addition, we have observed unexpected anomalies in the annealing process.

Time-resolved structural studies at synchrotrons and X-ray free electron lasers: opportunities and challenges

PubMed Central

Neutze, Richard; Moffat, Keith

2012-01-01

X-ray free electron lasers (XFELs) are potentially revolutionary X-ray sources because of their very short pulse duration, extreme peak brilliance and high spatial coherence, features that distinguish them from today’s synchrotron sources. We review recent time-resolved Laue diffraction and time-resolved wide angle X-ray scattering (WAXS) studies at synchrotron sources, and initial static studies at XFELs. XFELs have the potential to transform the field of time-resolved structural biology, yet many challenges arise in devising and adapting hardware, experimental design and data analysis strategies to exploit their unusual properties. Despite these challenges, we are confident that XFEL sources are poised to shed new light on ultrafast protein reaction dynamics. PMID:23021004

PAL-XFEL cavity beam position monitor pick-up design and beam test

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lee, Sojeong; Park, Young Jung; Kim, Changbum; Kim, Seung Hwan; Shin, Dong Cheol; Han, Jang-Hui; Ko, In Soo

2016-08-01

As an X-ray Free Electron Laser, PAL-XFEL is about to start beam commissioning. X-band cavity beam position monitor (BPM) is used in the PAL-XFEL undulator beam line. Prototypes of cavity BPM pick-up were designed and fabricated to test the RF characteristics. Also, the beam test of a cavity BPM pick-up was done in the Injector Test Facility (ITF). In the beam test, the raw signal properties of the cavity BPM pick-up were measured at a 200 pC bunch charge. According to the RF test and beam test results, the prototype cavity BPM pick-up design was confirmed to meet the requirements of the PAL-XFEL cavity BPM system.

Assessing the quantum physics impacts on future x-ray free-electron lasers

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Schmitt, Mark J.; Anisimov, Petr Mikhaylovich

A new quantum mechanical theory of x-ray free electron lasers (XFELs) has been successfully developed that has placed LANL at the forefront of the understanding of quantum effects in XFELs. Our quantum theory describes the interaction of relativistic electrons with x-ray radiation in the periodic magnetic field of an undulator using the same mathematical formalism as classical XFEL theory. This places classical and quantum treatments on the same footing and allows for a continuous transition from one regime to the other eliminating the disparate analytical approaches previously used. Moreover, Dr. Anisimov, the architect of this new theory, is now consideredmore » a resource in the international FEL community for assessing quantum effects in XFELs.« less

Harmonic lasing in x-ray free electron lasers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Schneidmiller, E. A.; Yurkov, M. V.

2012-08-01

Harmonic lasing in a free electron laser with a planar undulator (under the condition that the fundamental frequency is suppressed) might be a cheap and efficient way of extension of wavelength ranges of existing and planned x-ray free electron laser (FEL) facilities. Contrary to nonlinear harmonic generation, harmonic lasing can provide much more intense, stable, and narrow-band FEL beam which is easier to handle due to the suppressed fundamental frequency. In this paper we perform a parametrization of the solution of the eigenvalue equation for lasing at odd harmonics, and present an explicit expression for FEL gain length, taking into account all essential effects. We propose and discuss methods for suppression of the fundamental harmonic. We also suggest a combined use of harmonic lasing and lasing at the retuned fundamental wavelength in order to reduce bandwidth and to increase brilliance of x-ray beam at saturation. Considering 3rd harmonic lasing as a practical example, we come to the conclusion that it is much more robust than usually thought, and can be widely used in the existing or planned x-ray FEL (XFEL) facilities. In particular, Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) after a minor modification can lase to saturation at the 3rd harmonic up to the photon energy of 25-30 keV providing multigigawatt power level and narrow bandwidth. As for the European XFEL, harmonic lasing would allow one to extend operating range (ultimately up to 100 keV), to reduce FEL bandwidth and to increase brilliance, to enable two-color operation for pump-probe experiments, and to provide more flexible operation at different electron energies. Similar improvements can be realized in other x-ray FEL facilities with gap-tunable undulators like FLASH II, SACLA, LCLS II, etc. Harmonic lasing can be an attractive option for compact x-ray FELs (driven by electron beams with a relatively low energy), allowing the use of the standard undulator technology instead of small-gap in-vacuum devices. Finally, in this paper we discover that in a part of the parameter space, corresponding to the operating range of soft x-ray beam lines of x-ray FEL facilities (like SASE3 beam line of the European XFEL), harmonics can grow faster than the fundamental wavelength. This feature can be used in some experiments, but might also be an unwanted phenomenon, and we discuss possible measures to diminish it.

Intensity-dependent resonant transmission of x-rays in solid-density aluminum plasma

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Cho, M. S.; Chung, H.-K.; Cho, B. I.

2018-05-01

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) provide unique opportunities to generate and investigate dense plasmas. The absorption and transmission properties of x-ray photons in dense plasmas are important in characterizing the state of the plasmas. Experimental evidence shows that the transmission of x-ray photons through dense plasmas depends greatly on the incident XFEL intensity. Here, we present a detailed analysis of intensity-dependent x-ray transmission in solid-density aluminum using collisional-radiative population kinetics calculations. Reverse saturable absorption (RSA), i.e., an increase in x-ray absorption with intensity has been observed for photon energies below the K-absorption edge and in the intensity range of 1016-1017 W/cm2 for XFEL photons with 1487 eV. At higher intensities, a transition from RSA to saturable absorption (SA) is predicted; thus, the x-ray absorption decreases with intensity above a threshold value. For XFEL photon energies of 1501 eV and 1515 eV, the transition from RSA to SA occurs at XFEL intensities between 1017-1018 W/cm2. Electron temperatures are predicted to be in the range of 30-50 eV for the given experimental conditions. Detailed population kinetics of the charge states explains the intensity-dependent absorption of x-ray photons and the fast modulation of XFEL pulses for both RSA and SA.

The PixFEL project: Progress towards a fine pitch X-ray imaging camera for next generation FEL facilities

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rizzo, G.; Batignani, G.; Benkechkache, M. A.; Bettarini, S.; Casarosa, G.; Comotti, D.; Dalla Betta, G.-F.; Fabris, L.; Forti, F.; Grassi, M.; Lodola, L.; Malcovati, P.; Manghisoni, M.; Mendicino, R.; Morsani, F.; Paladino, A.; Pancheri, L.; Paoloni, E.; Ratti, L.; Re, V.; Traversi, G.; Vacchi, C.; Verzellesi, G.; Xu, H.

2016-07-01

The INFN PixFEL project is developing the fundamental building blocks for a large area X-ray imaging camera to be deployed at next generation free electron laser (FEL) facilities with unprecedented intensity. Improvement in performance beyond the state of art in imaging instrumentation will be explored adopting advanced technologies like active edge sensors, a 65 nm node CMOS process and vertical integration. These are the key ingredients of the PixFEL project to realize a seamless large area focal plane instrument composed by a matrix of multilayer four-side buttable tiles. In order to minimize the dead area and reduce ambiguities in image reconstruction, a fine pitch active edge thick sensor is being optimized to cope with very high intensity photon flux, up to 104 photons per pixel, in the range from 1 to 10 keV. A low noise analog front-end channel with this wide dynamic range and a novel dynamic compression feature, together with a low power 10 bit analog to digital conversion up to 5 MHz, has been realized in a 110 μm pitch with a 65 nm CMOS process. Vertical interconnection of two CMOS tiers will be also explored in the future to build a four-side buttable readout chip with high density memories. In the long run the objective of the PixFEL project is to build a flexible X-ray imaging camera for operation both in burst mode, like at the European X-FEL, or in continuous mode with the high frame rates anticipated for future FEL facilities.

Effect of slope errors on the performance of mirrors for x-ray free electron laser applications

DOE PAGES

Pardini, Tom; Cocco, Daniele; Hau-Riege, Stefan P.

2015-12-02

In this work we point out that slope errors play only a minor role in the performance of a certain class of x-ray optics for X-ray Free Electron Laser (XFEL) applications. Using physical optics propagation simulations and the formalism of Church and Takacs [Opt. Eng. 34, 353 (1995)], we show that diffraction limited optics commonly found at XFEL facilities posses a critical spatial wavelength that makes them less sensitive to slope errors, and more sensitive to height error. Given the number of XFELs currently operating or under construction across the world, we hope that this simple observation will help tomore » correctly define specifications for x-ray optics to be deployed at XFELs, possibly reducing the budget and the timeframe needed to complete the optical manufacturing and metrology.« less

Effect of slope errors on the performance of mirrors for x-ray free electron laser applications.

PubMed

Pardini, Tom; Cocco, Daniele; Hau-Riege, Stefan P

2015-12-14

In this work we point out that slope errors play only a minor role in the performance of a certain class of x-ray optics for X-ray Free Electron Laser (XFEL) applications. Using physical optics propagation simulations and the formalism of Church and Takacs [Opt. Eng. 34, 353 (1995)], we show that diffraction limited optics commonly found at XFEL facilities posses a critical spatial wavelength that makes them less sensitive to slope errors, and more sensitive to height error. Given the number of XFELs currently operating or under construction across the world, we hope that this simple observation will help to correctly define specifications for x-ray optics to be deployed at XFELs, possibly reducing the budget and the timeframe needed to complete the optical manufacturing and metrology.

Stimulated Electronic X-Ray Raman Scattering

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Weninger, Clemens; Purvis, Michael; Ryan, Duncan; London, Richard A.; Bozek, John D.; Bostedt, Christoph; Graf, Alexander; Brown, Gregory; Rocca, Jorge J.; Rohringer, Nina

2013-12-01

We demonstrate strong stimulated inelastic x-ray scattering by resonantly exciting a dense gas target of neon with femtosecond, high-intensity x-ray pulses from an x-ray free-electron laser (XFEL). A small number of lower energy XFEL seed photons drive an avalanche of stimulated resonant inelastic x-ray scattering processes that amplify the Raman scattering signal by several orders of magnitude until it reaches saturation. Despite the large overall spectral width, the internal spiky structure of the XFEL spectrum determines the energy resolution of the scattering process in a statistical sense. This is demonstrated by observing a stochastic line shift of the inelastically scattered x-ray radiation. In conjunction with statistical methods, XFELs can be used for stimulated resonant inelastic x-ray scattering, with spectral resolution smaller than the natural width of the core-excited, intermediate state.

Three-dimensional reconstruction for coherent diffraction patterns obtained by XFEL.

PubMed

Nakano, Miki; Miyashita, Osamu; Jonic, Slavica; Song, Changyong; Nam, Daewoong; Joti, Yasumasa; Tama, Florence

2017-07-01

The three-dimensional (3D) structural analysis of single particles using an X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) is a new structural biology technique that enables observations of molecules that are difficult to crystallize, such as flexible biomolecular complexes and living tissue in the state close to physiological conditions. In order to restore the 3D structure from the diffraction patterns obtained by the XFEL, computational algorithms are necessary as the orientation of the incident beam with respect to the sample needs to be estimated. A program package for XFEL single-particle analysis based on the Xmipp software package, that is commonly used for image processing in 3D cryo-electron microscopy, has been developed. The reconstruction program has been tested using diffraction patterns of an aerosol nanoparticle obtained by tomographic coherent X-ray diffraction microscopy.

Coherent X-Ray Diffraction Imaging of Chloroplasts from Cyanidioschyzon merolae by Using X-Ray Free Electron Laser.

PubMed

Takayama, Yuki; Inui, Yayoi; Sekiguchi, Yuki; Kobayashi, Amane; Oroguchi, Tomotaka; Yamamoto, Masaki; Matsunaga, Sachihiro; Nakasako, Masayoshi

2015-07-01

Coherent X-ray diffraction imaging (CXDI) is a lens-less technique for visualizing the structures of non-crystalline particles with the dimensions of submicrometer to micrometer at a resolution of several tens of nanometers. We conducted cryogenic CXDI experiments at 66 K to visualize the internal structures of frozen-hydrated chloroplasts of Cyanidioschyzon merolae using X-ray free electron laser (XFEL) as a coherent X-ray source. Chloroplast dispersed specimen disks at a number density of 7/(10×10 µm(2)) were flash-cooled with liquid ethane without staining, sectioning or chemical labeling. Chloroplasts are destroyed at atomic level immediately after the diffraction by XFEL pulses. Thus, diffraction patterns with a good signal-to-noise ratio from single chloroplasts were selected from many diffraction patterns collected through scanning specimen disks to provide fresh specimens into the irradiation area. The electron density maps of single chloroplasts projected along the direction of the incident X-ray beam were reconstructed by using the iterative phase-retrieval method and multivariate analyses. The electron density map at a resolution of 70 nm appeared as a C-shape. In addition, the fluorescence image of proteins stained with Flamingo™ dye also appeared as a C-shape as did the autofluorescence from Chl. The similar images suggest that the thylakoid membranes with an abundance of proteins distribute along the outer membranes of chloroplasts. To confirm the present results statistically, a number of projection structures must be accumulated through high-throughput data collection in the near future. Based on the results, we discuss the feasibility of XFEL-CXDI experiments in the structural analyses of cellular organelles. © The Author 2015. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Japanese Society of Plant Physiologists. All rights reserved. For permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com.

Use of the BINP HLS to measure vertical changes in the locations of the building and ground at the PAL-XFEL

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Choi, Hyo-Jin; Seo, Kwang-Won; Gil, Kye-Hwan; Kim, Seung-Hwan; Kang, Heung-Sik

2016-09-01

The Pohang Accelerator Laboratory's X-ray free-electron laser (PAL-XFEL), a 4 th generation light source, is currently being installed and will be completed by December 2015 so that users can be supported beginning in 2016. The PAL-XFEL equipment must continuously maintain the bunch-tobunch beam parameters (60 Hz, Energy: 10 GeV, Charge: 200 pC, Bunch Length: 60 fs, Emittance X/Y: 0.481/0.256 mm rad) in order to supply stable photons with the energy and flux appropriate for tests by beamline users. To this end, the PAL-XFEL equipment has to be kept precisely aligned (Linear Accelerator: +/- 100 μm, Undulator: +/- 50 μm). As a part of the process for installing the PAL-XFEL, a GPS-using surface geodetic network is being constructed for precise equipment measurement and alignment, and the installation of a tunnel measurement network inside the buildings is in the preparation stage; additionally, the fiducialization of major equipment is underway. After the PAL-XFEL equipment is optimized and aligned, if the ground and the buildings go through vertical changes during operation, misalignment (and tilt) of the equipment, including various magnets and RF structures, will cause errors in the electron beam's trajectory, which will lead to changes to the beam parameters. For continuous and systemic measurement of vertical changes in the buildings and monitoring of ground sinking and uplifting, the Budker Institute of Nuclear Physics (BINP) Ultrasonic-type Hydrostatic Levelling System (HLS) is to be installed and operated in all sections of the PAL-XFEL for the linear accelerator, the insertion device (undulator) and the beamline. This study will introduce the operation principle, design concept, and advantages (self-calibration) of the HLS and will outline its installation plan and operation plan.

Investigating radiation induced damage processes with femtosecond x-ray pulses (Conference Presentation)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Song, Changyong

2017-05-01

Interest in high-resolution structure investigation has been zealous, especially with the advent of X-ray free electron lasers (XFELs). The intense and ultra-short X-ray laser pulses ( 10 GW) pave new routes to explore structures and dynamics of single macromolecules, functional nanomaterials and complex electronic materials. In the last several years, we have developed XFEL single-shot diffraction imaging by probing ultrafast phase changes directly. Pump-probe single-shot imaging was realized by synchronizing femtosecond (<10 fs in FWHM) X-ray laser (probe) with femtosecond (50 fs) IR laser (pump) at better than 1 ps resolution. Nanoparticles under intense fs-laser pulses were investigated with fs XFEL pulses to provide insight into the irreversible particle damage processes with nanoscale resolution. Research effort, introduced, aims to extend the current spatio-temporal resolution beyond the present limit. We expect this single-shot dynamic imaging to open new science opportunity with XFELs.

Radiation-Induced Chemical Dynamics in Ar Clusters Exposed to Strong X-Ray Pulses.

PubMed

Kumagai, Yoshiaki; Jurek, Zoltan; Xu, Weiqing; Fukuzawa, Hironobu; Motomura, Koji; Iablonskyi, Denys; Nagaya, Kiyonobu; Wada, Shin-Ichi; Mondal, Subhendu; Tachibana, Tetsuya; Ito, Yuta; Sakai, Tsukasa; Matsunami, Kenji; Nishiyama, Toshiyuki; Umemoto, Takayuki; Nicolas, Christophe; Miron, Catalin; Togashi, Tadashi; Ogawa, Kanade; Owada, Shigeki; Tono, Kensuke; Yabashi, Makina; Son, Sang-Kil; Ziaja, Beata; Santra, Robin; Ueda, Kiyoshi

2018-06-01

We show that electron and ion spectroscopy reveals the details of the oligomer formation in Ar clusters exposed to an x-ray free electron laser (XFEL) pulse, i.e., chemical dynamics triggered by x rays. With guidance from a dedicated molecular dynamics simulation tool, we find that van der Waals bonding, the oligomer formation mechanism, and charge transfer among the cluster constituents significantly affect ionization dynamics induced by an XFEL pulse of moderate fluence. Our results clearly demonstrate that XFEL pulses can be used not only to "damage and destroy" molecular assemblies but also to modify and transform their molecular structure. The accuracy of the predictions obtained makes it possible to apply the cluster spectroscopy, in connection with the respective simulations, for estimation of the XFEL pulse fluence in the fluence regime below single-atom multiple-photon absorption, which is hardly accessible with other diagnostic tools.

Radiation-Induced Chemical Dynamics in Ar Clusters Exposed to Strong X-Ray Pulses

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kumagai, Yoshiaki; Jurek, Zoltan; Xu, Weiqing; Fukuzawa, Hironobu; Motomura, Koji; Iablonskyi, Denys; Nagaya, Kiyonobu; Wada, Shin-ichi; Mondal, Subhendu; Tachibana, Tetsuya; Ito, Yuta; Sakai, Tsukasa; Matsunami, Kenji; Nishiyama, Toshiyuki; Umemoto, Takayuki; Nicolas, Christophe; Miron, Catalin; Togashi, Tadashi; Ogawa, Kanade; Owada, Shigeki; Tono, Kensuke; Yabashi, Makina; Son, Sang-Kil; Ziaja, Beata; Santra, Robin; Ueda, Kiyoshi

2018-06-01

We show that electron and ion spectroscopy reveals the details of the oligomer formation in Ar clusters exposed to an x-ray free electron laser (XFEL) pulse, i.e., chemical dynamics triggered by x rays. With guidance from a dedicated molecular dynamics simulation tool, we find that van der Waals bonding, the oligomer formation mechanism, and charge transfer among the cluster constituents significantly affect ionization dynamics induced by an XFEL pulse of moderate fluence. Our results clearly demonstrate that XFEL pulses can be used not only to "damage and destroy" molecular assemblies but also to modify and transform their molecular structure. The accuracy of the predictions obtained makes it possible to apply the cluster spectroscopy, in connection with the respective simulations, for estimation of the XFEL pulse fluence in the fluence regime below single-atom multiple-photon absorption, which is hardly accessible with other diagnostic tools.

Compact double-bunch x-ray free electron lasers for fresh bunch self-seeding and harmonic lasing

DOE PAGES

Emma, C.; Feng, Y.; Nguyen, D. C.; ...

2017-03-03

This study presents a novel method to improve the longitudinal coherence, efficiency and maximum photon energy of x-ray free electron lasers (XFELs). The method is equivalent to having two separate concatenated XFELs. The first uses one bunch of electrons to reach the saturation regime, generating a high power self-amplified spontaneous emission x-ray pulse at the fundamental and third harmonic. The x-ray pulse is filtered through an attenuator/monochromator and seeds a different electron bunch in the second FEL, using the fundamental and/or third harmonic as an input signal. In our method we combine the two XFELs operating with two bunches, separatedmore » by one or more rf cycles, in the same linear accelerator. We discuss the advantages and applications of the proposed system for present and future XFELs.« less

Thermal Analysis of the European XFEL Intersection Control Rack

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Concha, P.; Vazquez, C.

2014-04-01

The three undulator segments of the European X-ray Free Electron Laser contain a total of 88 intersections cells. Each intersection accommodates a quadrupole magnet on top of a high precision X-Y positioning table, a beam position monitor, four air coil correctors and a phase shifter. The Intersection Control Rack is an electrical cabinet containing the necessary electronics to control both the quadrupole and the phase shifter movements (which are stepper motor based) with a repeatability of less than 1 um and 10 um, respectively. Four different cabinets have been extensively tested to ensure that they meet specifications. These tests include a thermal analysis to study position measurements dependence on the temperature. This paper introduces a description of the thermal issue, analyses the causes and consequences of heating, presents the results of the different tests performed, and concludes the best design and operating conditions to achieve a good performance.

Stochastic stimulated electronic x-ray Raman spectroscopy

PubMed Central

Kimberg, Victor; Rohringer, Nina

2016-01-01

Resonant inelastic x-ray scattering (RIXS) is a well-established tool for studying electronic, nuclear, and collective dynamics of excited atoms, molecules, and solids. An extension of this powerful method to a time-resolved probe technique at x-ray free electron lasers (XFELs) to ultimately unravel ultrafast chemical and structural changes on a femtosecond time scale is often challenging, due to the small signal rate in conventional implementations at XFELs that rely on the usage of a monochromator setup to select a small frequency band of the broadband, spectrally incoherent XFEL radiation. Here, we suggest an alternative approach, based on stochastic spectroscopy, which uses the full bandwidth of the incoming XFEL pulses. Our proposed method is relying on stimulated resonant inelastic x-ray scattering, where in addition to a pump pulse that resonantly excites the system a probe pulse on a specific electronic inelastic transition is provided, which serves as a seed in the stimulated scattering process. The limited spectral coherence of the XFEL radiation defines the energy resolution in this process and stimulated RIXS spectra of high resolution can be obtained by covariance analysis of the transmitted spectra. We present a detailed feasibility study and predict signal strengths for realistic XFEL parameters for the CO molecule resonantly pumped at the O1s→π* transition. Our theoretical model describes the evolution of the spectral and temporal characteristics of the transmitted x-ray radiation, by solving the equation of motion for the electronic and vibrational degrees of freedom of the system self consistently with the propagation by Maxwell equations. PMID:26958585

Methods development for diffraction and spectroscopy studies of metalloenzymes at X-ray free-electron lasers

PubMed Central

Kern, Jan; Hattne, Johan; Tran, Rosalie; Alonso-Mori, Roberto; Laksmono, Hartawan; Gul, Sheraz; Sierra, Raymond G.; Rehanek, Jens; Erko, Alexei; Mitzner, Rolf; Wernet, Phillip; Bergmann, Uwe; Sauter, Nicholas K.; Yachandra, Vittal; Yano, Junko

2014-01-01

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) open up new possibilities for X-ray crystallographic and spectroscopic studies of radiation-sensitive biological samples under close to physiological conditions. To facilitate these new X-ray sources, tailored experimental methods and data-processing protocols have to be developed. The highly radiation-sensitive photosystem II (PSII) protein complex is a prime target for XFEL experiments aiming to study the mechanism of light-induced water oxidation taking place at a Mn cluster in this complex. We developed a set of tools for the study of PSII at XFELs, including a new liquid jet based on electrofocusing, an energy dispersive von Hamos X-ray emission spectrometer for the hard X-ray range and a high-throughput soft X-ray spectrometer based on a reflection zone plate. While our immediate focus is on PSII, the methods we describe here are applicable to a wide range of metalloenzymes. These experimental developments were complemented by a new software suite, cctbx.xfel. This software suite allows for near-real-time monitoring of the experimental parameters and detector signals and the detailed analysis of the diffraction and spectroscopy data collected by us at the Linac Coherent Light Source, taking into account the specific characteristics of data measured at an XFEL. PMID:24914169

Opportunities and challenges for time-resolved studies of protein structural dynamics at X-ray free-electron lasers.

PubMed

Neutze, Richard

2014-07-17

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) are revolutionary X-ray sources. Their time structure, providing X-ray pulses of a few tens of femtoseconds in duration; and their extreme peak brilliance, delivering approximately 10(12) X-ray photons per pulse and facilitating sub-micrometre focusing, distinguish XFEL sources from synchrotron radiation. In this opinion piece, I argue that these properties of XFEL radiation will facilitate new discoveries in life science. I reason that time-resolved serial femtosecond crystallography and time-resolved wide angle X-ray scattering are promising areas of scientific investigation that will be advanced by XFEL capabilities, allowing new scientific questions to be addressed that are not accessible using established methods at storage ring facilities. These questions include visualizing ultrafast protein structural dynamics on the femtosecond to picosecond time-scale, as well as time-resolved diffraction studies of non-cyclic reactions. I argue that these emerging opportunities will stimulate a renaissance of interest in time-resolved structural biochemistry.

A 100 J-level nanosecond DPSSL for high energy density experiments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Butcher, Thomas; Mason, Paul; Banerjee, Saumyabrata; Ertel, Klaus; Phillips, P. Jonathan; Smith, Jodie; De Vido, Mariastefania; Chekhlov, Oleg; Divoky, Martin; Pilat, Jan; Priebe, Gerd; Toncian, Toma; Shaikh, Waseem; Hooker, Chris; Lucianetti, Antonio; Hernandez-Gomez, Cristina; Mocek, Tomas; Edwards, Chris; Collier, John

2017-05-01

We present an overview of the cryo-amplifier concept and design utilized in the DiPOLE100 laser system built for use at the HiLASE Center, which has been successfully tested operating at an average power of 1kW. Following this we describe the alterations made to the design in the second generation system being constructed for high energy density (HED) experiments in the HED beamline at the European XFEL. These changes are predominantly geometric in nature, however also include improved mount design and improved control over the temporal shape of the output pulse. Finally, we comment on future plans for development of the DiPOLE laser amplifier architecture.

FreeDam - A webtool for free-electron laser-induced damage in femtosecond X-ray crystallography

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jönsson, H. Olof; Östlin, Christofer; Scott, Howard A.; Chapman, Henry N.; Aplin, Steve J.; Tîmneanu, Nicuşor; Caleman, Carl

2018-03-01

Over the last decade X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) sources have been made available to the scientific community. One of the most successful uses of these new machines has been protein crystallography. When samples are exposed to the intense short X-ray pulses provided by the XFELs, the sample quickly becomes highly ionized and the atomic structure is affected. Here we present a webtool dubbed FreeDam based on non-thermal plasma simulations, for estimation of radiation damage in free-electron laser experiments in terms of ionization, temperatures and atomic displacements. The aim is to make this tool easily accessible to scientists who are planning and performing experiments at XFELs.

Rapid microfluidic mixing and liquid jets for studying biomolecular chemical dynamics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Langley, Daniel; Abbey, Brian

2018-01-01

X-ray Free-Electron Lasers (XFELs) offer a unique opportunity to study the structural dynamics of proteins on a femtosecond time-scale. To realize the full potential of XFEL sources for studying time-resolved biomolecular processes however, requires the optimization and development of devices that can both act as a trigger and a delivery mechanism for the system of interest. Here we present numerical simulations and actual devices exploring the conditions required for the development of successful mixing and injection devices for tracking the molecular dynamics of proteins in solution on micro to nanosecond timescales using XFELs. The mechanism for combining reagents employs a threefold combination of pico-liter volumes, lamination and serpentine mixing. Focusing and delivering the sample in solution is achieved using the Gas Dynamic Virtual Nozzle (GDVN), which was specifically developed to produce a micrometer diameter, in-vacuum liquid jet. We explore the influence of parameters such as flow rate and gas pressure on the mixing time and jet stability, and explore the formation of rapid homogeneously mixed jets for `mix-and-inject' liquid scattering experiments at Synchrotron and XFEL facilities.

Merging single-shot XFEL diffraction data from inorganic nanoparticles: a new approach to size and orientation determination

DOE PAGES

Li, Xuanxuan; Spence, John C. H.; Hogue, Brenda G.; ...

2017-09-22

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) provide new opportunities for structure determination of biomolecules, viruses and nanomaterials. With unprecedented peak brilliance and ultra-short pulse duration, XFELs can tolerate higher X-ray doses by exploiting the femtosecond-scale exposure time, and can thus go beyond the resolution limits achieved with conventional X-ray diffraction imaging techniques. Using XFELs, it is possible to collect scattering information from single particles at high resolution, however particle heterogeneity and unknown orientations complicate data merging in three-dimensional space. Using the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS), synthetic inorganic nanocrystals with a core–shell architecture were used as a model system for proof-of-principle coherentmore » diffractive single-particle imaging experiments. To deal with the heterogeneity of the core–shell particles, new computational methods have been developed to extract the particle size and orientation from the scattering data to assist data merging. The size distribution agrees with that obtained by electron microscopy and the merged data support a model with a core–shell architecture.« less

Merging single-shot XFEL diffraction data from inorganic nanoparticles: a new approach to size and orientation determination

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Li, Xuanxuan; Spence, John C. H.; Hogue, Brenda G.

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) provide new opportunities for structure determination of biomolecules, viruses and nanomaterials. With unprecedented peak brilliance and ultra-short pulse duration, XFELs can tolerate higher X-ray doses by exploiting the femtosecond-scale exposure time, and can thus go beyond the resolution limits achieved with conventional X-ray diffraction imaging techniques. Using XFELs, it is possible to collect scattering information from single particles at high resolution, however particle heterogeneity and unknown orientations complicate data merging in three-dimensional space. Using the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS), synthetic inorganic nanocrystals with a core–shell architecture were used as a model system for proof-of-principle coherentmore » diffractive single-particle imaging experiments. To deal with the heterogeneity of the core–shell particles, new computational methods have been developed to extract the particle size and orientation from the scattering data to assist data merging. The size distribution agrees with that obtained by electron microscopy and the merged data support a model with a core–shell architecture.« less

Single-pulse enhanced coherent diffraction imaging of bacteria with an X-ray free-electron laser

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fan, Jiadong; Sun, Zhibin; Wang, Yaling; Park, Jaehyun; Kim, Sunam; Gallagher-Jones, Marcus; Kim, Yoonhee; Song, Changyong; Yao, Shengkun; Zhang, Jian; Zhang, Jianhua; Duan, Xiulan; Tono, Kensuke; Yabashi, Makina; Ishikawa, Tetsuya; Fan, Chunhai; Zhao, Yuliang; Chai, Zhifang; Gao, Xueyun; Earnest, Thomas; Jiang, Huaidong

2016-09-01

High-resolution imaging offers one of the most promising approaches for exploring and understanding the structure and function of biomaterials and biological systems. X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) combined with coherent diffraction imaging can theoretically provide high-resolution spatial information regarding biological materials using a single XFEL pulse. Currently, the application of this method suffers from the low scattering cross-section of biomaterials and X-ray damage to the sample. However, XFELs can provide pulses of such short duration that the data can be collected using the “diffract and destroy” approach before the effects of radiation damage on the data become significant. These experiments combine the use of enhanced coherent diffraction imaging with single-shot XFEL radiation to investigate the cellular architecture of Staphylococcus aureus with and without labeling by gold (Au) nanoclusters. The resolution of the images reconstructed from these diffraction patterns were twice as high or more for gold-labeled samples, demonstrating that this enhancement method provides a promising approach for the high-resolution imaging of biomaterials and biological systems.

Single-pulse enhanced coherent diffraction imaging of bacteria with an X-ray free-electron laser

PubMed Central

Fan, Jiadong; Sun, Zhibin; Wang, Yaling; Park, Jaehyun; Kim, Sunam; Gallagher-Jones, Marcus; Kim, Yoonhee; Song, Changyong; Yao, Shengkun; Zhang, Jian; Zhang, Jianhua; Duan, Xiulan; Tono, Kensuke; Yabashi, Makina; Ishikawa, Tetsuya; Fan, Chunhai; Zhao, Yuliang; Chai, Zhifang; Gao, Xueyun; Earnest, Thomas; Jiang, Huaidong

2016-01-01

High-resolution imaging offers one of the most promising approaches for exploring and understanding the structure and function of biomaterials and biological systems. X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) combined with coherent diffraction imaging can theoretically provide high-resolution spatial information regarding biological materials using a single XFEL pulse. Currently, the application of this method suffers from the low scattering cross-section of biomaterials and X-ray damage to the sample. However, XFELs can provide pulses of such short duration that the data can be collected using the “diffract and destroy” approach before the effects of radiation damage on the data become significant. These experiments combine the use of enhanced coherent diffraction imaging with single-shot XFEL radiation to investigate the cellular architecture of Staphylococcus aureus with and without labeling by gold (Au) nanoclusters. The resolution of the images reconstructed from these diffraction patterns were twice as high or more for gold-labeled samples, demonstrating that this enhancement method provides a promising approach for the high-resolution imaging of biomaterials and biological systems. PMID:27659203

Single-pulse enhanced coherent diffraction imaging of bacteria with an X-ray free-electron laser.

PubMed

Fan, Jiadong; Sun, Zhibin; Wang, Yaling; Park, Jaehyun; Kim, Sunam; Gallagher-Jones, Marcus; Kim, Yoonhee; Song, Changyong; Yao, Shengkun; Zhang, Jian; Zhang, Jianhua; Duan, Xiulan; Tono, Kensuke; Yabashi, Makina; Ishikawa, Tetsuya; Fan, Chunhai; Zhao, Yuliang; Chai, Zhifang; Gao, Xueyun; Earnest, Thomas; Jiang, Huaidong

2016-09-23

High-resolution imaging offers one of the most promising approaches for exploring and understanding the structure and function of biomaterials and biological systems. X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) combined with coherent diffraction imaging can theoretically provide high-resolution spatial information regarding biological materials using a single XFEL pulse. Currently, the application of this method suffers from the low scattering cross-section of biomaterials and X-ray damage to the sample. However, XFELs can provide pulses of such short duration that the data can be collected using the "diffract and destroy" approach before the effects of radiation damage on the data become significant. These experiments combine the use of enhanced coherent diffraction imaging with single-shot XFEL radiation to investigate the cellular architecture of Staphylococcus aureus with and without labeling by gold (Au) nanoclusters. The resolution of the images reconstructed from these diffraction patterns were twice as high or more for gold-labeled samples, demonstrating that this enhancement method provides a promising approach for the high-resolution imaging of biomaterials and biological systems.

Nonlinear X-Ray and Auger Spectroscopy at X-Ray Free-Electron Laser Sources

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rohringer, Nina

2015-05-01

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) open the pathway to transfer non-linear spectroscopic techniques to the x-ray domain. A promising all x-ray pump probe technique is based on coherent stimulated electronic x-ray Raman scattering, which was recently demonstrated in atomic neon. By tuning the XFEL pulse to core-excited resonances, a few seed photons in the spectral tail of the XFEL pulse drive an avalanche of resonant inelastic x-ray scattering events, resulting in exponential amplification of the scattering signal by of 6-7 orders of magnitude. Analysis of the line profile of the emitted radiation permits to demonstrate the cross over from amplified spontaneous emission to coherent stimulated resonance scattering. In combination with statistical covariance mapping, a high-resolution spectrum of the resonant inelastic scattering process can be obtained, opening the path to coherent stimulated x-ray Raman spectroscopy. An extension of these ideas to molecules and a realistic feasibility study of stimulated electronic x-ray Raman scattering in CO will be presented. Challenges to realizing stimulated electronic x-ray Raman scattering at present-day XFEL sources will be discussed, corroborated by results of a recent experiment at the LCLS XFEL. Due to the small gain cross section in molecular targets, other nonlinear spectroscopic techniques such as nonlinear Auger spectroscopy could become a powerful alternative. Theory predictions of a novel pump probe technique based on resonant nonlinear Auger spectroscopic will be discussed and the method will be compared to stimulated x-ray Raman spectroscopy.

Parameter Optimization of PAL-XFEL Injector

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lee, Jaehyun; Ko, In Soo; Han, Jang-Hui; Hong, Juho; Yang, Haeryong; Min, Chang Ki; Kang, Heung-Sik

2018-05-01

A photoinjector is used as the electron source to generate a high peak current and low emittance beam for an X-ray free electron laser (FEL). The beam emittance is one of the critical parameters to determine the FEL performance together with the slice energy spread and the peak current. The Pohang Accelerator Laboratory X-ray Free Electron Laser (PAL-XFEL) was constructed in 2015, and the beam commissioning was carried out in spring 2016. The injector is running routinely for PAL-XFEL user operation. The operational parameters of the injector have been optimized experimentally, and these are somewhat different from the originally designed ones. Therefore, we study numerically the injector parameters based on the empirically optimized parameters and review the present operating condition.

Development of new S-band SLED for PAL-XFEL Linac

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Joo, Youngdo; Park, Yongjung; Heo, Hoon; Heo, Jinyul; Park, Sung-Soo; Kim, Sang-Hee; Kim, Kwang-Hoon; Kang, Heung-Sik; Lee, Heung-Soo; Noh, Sungju; Oh, Kyoungmin

2017-01-01

In order to achieve beam acceleration to the beam energy of 10 GeV at the end of its 716 m-long linear accelerator (Linac), the Pohang Accelerator Laboratory X-ray Free Electron Laser (PAL-XFEL) is going to operate the Stanford Linear Accelerator Energy Doubler (SLED) at the maximum klystron output peak power of 80 MW, with a pulse length of 4 μs, and at a repetition rate of 60 Hz. The original SLED that had been used in Pohang Light Source-II (PLS-II) can no longer sustain such a high-power operation because excessive radiation caused by RF breakdown has been frequently detected even at the lower klystron peak power during the PLS-II operation. Therefore, a new SLED is designed by modifying both the 3-dB power hybrid and the waveguide-cavity coupling structure of the original SLED where the excessive radiation has been mainly detected. The finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) simulation in the CST Microwave Studio shows that the new SLED has a peak electric field and a surface current lower than those of the original SLED at the same level of the RF input peak power, which would secure stable high-power operation. All of the 42 SLEDs in the PAL-XFEL Linac are newly fabricated and installed. During the RF conditioning of the PAL-XFEL Linac, no significant vacuum and radiation issue was found in the new SLEDs. Finally, the accelerated electron beam energy of 10 GeV obtained at the end of the PAL-XFEL Linac verified that the RF performance of the new SLED is stable.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Vannoni, M., E-mail: maurizio.vannoni@xfel.eu; Freijo Martín, I.

The European XFEL (X-ray Free Electron Laser) is a large facility under construction in Hamburg, Germany. It will provide a transversally fully coherent x-ray radiation with outstanding characteristics: high repetition rate (up to 2700 pulses with a 0.6 ms long pulse train at 10 Hz), short wavelength (down to 0.05 nm), short pulse (in the femtoseconds scale), and high average brilliance (1.6 ⋅ 10{sup 25} (photons s{sup −1} mm{sup −2} mrad{sup −2})/0.1% bandwidth). The beam has very high pulse energy; therefore, it has to be spread out on a relatively long mirror (about 1 m). Due to the very shortmore » wavelength, the mirrors need to have a high quality surface on their entire length, and this is considered very challenging even with the most advanced polishing methods. In order to measure the mirrors and to characterize their interaction with the mechanical mount, we equipped a metrology laboratory with a large aperture Fizeau interferometer. The system is a classical 100 mm diameter commercial Fizeau, with an additional expander providing a 300 mm diameter beam. Despite the commercial nature of the system, special care has been taken in the polishing of the reference flats and in the expander quality. We report the first commissioning of the instrument, its calibration, and performance characterization, together with some preliminary results with the measurement of a 950 mm silicon substrate. The intended application is to characterize the final XFEL mirrors with nanometer accuracy.« less

Analyzing the effect of slotted foil on radiation pulse profile in a mode locked afterburner X-ray free electron laser

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kumar, Sandeep; Hur, Min Sup; Chung, Moses

2017-06-01

Extremely short X-ray pulses in the attosecond (as) range are important tools for ultrafast dynamics, high resolution microscopy, and nuclear dynamics study. In this paper, we numerically examine the generation of gigawatt (GW) mode-locked (ML) multichromatic X-rays using the parameters of the Pohang Accelerator Laboratory (PAL)-X-ray free electron laser (XFEL), the Korean XFEL. In this vein, we analyze the ML-FEL [Thompson and McNeil, Phys. Rev. Lett. 100, 203901 (2008)] and mode-locked afterburner (MLAB) FEL [Dunning et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 110, 104801 (2013)] schemes on the hard X-ray beamline of the PAL-XFEL. Using the ML scheme, we numerically demonstrate a train of radiation pulses in the hard X-ray (photon energy ˜12.4 keV) with 3.5 GW power and 16 as full-width half maximum (FWHM) pulse duration. On the other hand, using the MLAB scheme, a train of radiation pulses with 3 GW power and 1 as FWHM (900 zs in RMS) pulse duration has been obtained at 12.4 keV photon energy. Both schemes generate broadband, discrete, and coherent spectrum compared to the XFEL's narrowband spectrum. Furthermore, the effect of slotted foil is also studied first time on the MLAB-FEL output. Numerical comparisons show that the temporal structure of the MLAB-FEL output can be improved significantly by the use of the slotted foil. Such short X-ray pulses at XFEL facilities will allow the studies of electron-nuclear and nuclear dynamics in atoms or molecules, and the broadband radiation will substantially improve the efficiency of the experimental techniques such as X-ray crystallography and spectroscopy, paving the way for outstanding progress in biology and material science.

Observation of femtosecond X-ray interactions with matter using an X-ray–X-ray pump–probe scheme

PubMed Central

Inoue, Ichiro; Inubushi, Yuichi; Sato, Takahiro; Tono, Kensuke; Katayama, Tetsuo; Kameshima, Takashi; Ogawa, Kanade; Togashi, Tadashi; Owada, Shigeki; Amemiya, Yoshiyuki; Tanaka, Takashi; Hara, Toru

2016-01-01

Resolution in the X-ray structure determination of noncrystalline samples has been limited to several tens of nanometers, because deep X-ray irradiation required for enhanced resolution causes radiation damage to samples. However, theoretical studies predict that the femtosecond (fs) durations of X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) pulses make it possible to record scattering signals before the initiation of X-ray damage processes; thus, an ultraintense X-ray beam can be used beyond the conventional limit of radiation dose. Here, we verify this scenario by directly observing femtosecond X-ray damage processes in diamond irradiated with extraordinarily intense (∼1019 W/cm2) XFEL pulses. An X-ray pump–probe diffraction scheme was developed in this study; tightly focused double–5-fs XFEL pulses with time separations ranging from sub-fs to 80 fs were used to excite (i.e., pump) the diamond and characterize (i.e., probe) the temporal changes of the crystalline structures through Bragg reflection. It was found that the pump and probe diffraction intensities remain almost constant for shorter time separations of the double pulse, whereas the probe diffraction intensities decreased after 20 fs following pump pulse irradiation due to the X-ray–induced atomic displacement. This result indicates that sub-10-fs XFEL pulses enable conductions of damageless structural determinations and supports the validity of the theoretical predictions of ultraintense X-ray–matter interactions. The X-ray pump–probe scheme demonstrated here would be effective for understanding ultraintense X-ray–matter interactions, which will greatly stimulate advanced XFEL applications, such as atomic structure determination of a single molecule and generation of exotic matters with high energy densities. PMID:26811449

Nonlocal heat transport and improved target design for x-ray heating studies at x-ray free electron lasers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hoidn, Oliver; Seidler, Gerald T.

2018-01-01

The extremely high-power densities and short durations of single pulses of x-ray free electron lasers (XFELs) have opened new opportunities in atomic physics, where complex excitation-relaxation chains allow for high ionization states in atomic and molecular systems, and in dense plasma physics, where XFEL heating of solid-density targets can create unique dense states of matter having temperatures on the order of the Fermi energy. We focus here on the latter phenomena, with special emphasis on the problem of optimum target design to achieve high x-ray heating into the warm dense matter (WDM) state. We report fully three-dimensional simulations of the incident x-ray pulse and the resulting multielectron relaxation cascade to model the spatial energy density deposition in multicomponent targets, with particular focus on the effects of nonlocal heat transport due to the motion of high energy photoelectrons and Auger electrons. We find that nanoscale high-Z /low-Z multicomponent targets can give much improved energy density deposition in lower-Z materials, with enhancements reaching a factor of 100. This has three important benefits. First, it greatly enlarges the thermodynamic parameter space in XFEL x-ray heating studies of lower-Z materials. Second, it allows the use of higher probe photon energies, enabling higher-information content x-ray diffraction (XRD) measurements such as in two-color XFEL operations. Third, while this is merely one step toward optimization of x-ray heating target design, the demonstration of the importance of nonlocal heat transport establishes important common ground between XFEL-based x-ray heating studies and more traditional laser plasma methods.

Two-dimensional imaging detectors for structural biology with X-ray lasers.

PubMed

Denes, Peter

2014-07-17

Our ability to harness the advances in microelectronics over the past decade(s) for X-ray detection has resulted in significant improvements in the state of the art. Biology with X-ray free-electron lasers present daunting detector challenges: all of the photons arrive at the same time, and individual high peak power pulses must be read out shot-by-shot. Direct X-ray detection in silicon pixel detectors--monolithic or hybrid--are the standard for XFELs today. For structural biology, improvements are needed for today's 10-100 Hz XFELs, and further improvements are required for tomorrow's 10+ kHz XFELs. This article will discuss detector challenges, why they arise and ways to overcome them, along with the current state of the art. © 2014 The Author(s) Published by the Royal Society. All rights reserved.

X-ray laser–induced electron dynamics observed by femtosecond diffraction from nanocrystals of Buckminsterfullerene

PubMed Central

Abbey, Brian; Dilanian, Ruben A.; Darmanin, Connie; Ryan, Rebecca A.; Putkunz, Corey T.; Martin, Andrew V.; Wood, David; Streltsov, Victor; Jones, Michael W. M.; Gaffney, Naylyn; Hofmann, Felix; Williams, Garth J.; Boutet, Sébastien; Messerschmidt, Marc; Seibert, M. Marvin; Williams, Sophie; Curwood, Evan; Balaur, Eugeniu; Peele, Andrew G.; Nugent, Keith A.; Quiney, Harry M.

2016-01-01

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) deliver x-ray pulses with a coherent flux that is approximately eight orders of magnitude greater than that available from a modern third-generation synchrotron source. The power density of an XFEL pulse may be so high that it can modify the electronic properties of a sample on a femtosecond time scale. Exploration of the interaction of intense coherent x-ray pulses and matter is both of intrinsic scientific interest and of critical importance to the interpretation of experiments that probe the structures of materials using high-brightness femtosecond XFEL pulses. We report observations of the diffraction of extremely intense 32-fs nanofocused x-ray pulses by a powder sample of crystalline C60. We find that the diffraction pattern at the highest available incident power significantly differs from the one obtained using either third-generation synchrotron sources or XFEL sources operating at low output power and does not correspond to the diffraction pattern expected from any known phase of crystalline C60. We interpret these data as evidence of a long-range, coherent dynamic electronic distortion that is driven by the interaction of the periodic array of C60 molecular targets with intense x-ray pulses of femtosecond duration. PMID:27626076

Atomistic Simulations of High-intensity XFEL Pulses on Diffractive Imaging of Nano-sized System Dynamics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ho, Phay; Knight, Christopher; Bostedt, Christoph; Young, Linda; Tegze, Miklos; Faigel, Gyula

2016-05-01

We have developed a large-scale atomistic computational method based on a combined Monte Carlo and Molecular Dynamics (MC/MD) method to simulate XFEL-induced radiation damage dynamics of complex materials. The MD algorithm is used to propagate the trajectories of electrons, ions and atoms forward in time and the quantum nature of interactions with an XFEL pulse is accounted for by a MC method to calculate probabilities of electronic transitions. Our code has good scalability with MPI/OpenMP parallelization, and it has been run on Mira, a petascale system at the Argonne Leardership Computing Facility, with particle number >50 million. Using this code, we have examined the impact of high-intensity 8-keV XFEL pulses on the x-ray diffraction patterns of argon clusters. The obtained patterns show strong pulse parameter dependence, providing evidence of significant lattice rearrangement and diffuse scattering. Real-space electronic reconstruction was performed using phase retrieval methods. We found that the structure of the argon cluster can be recovered with atomic resolution even in the presence of considerable radiation damage. This work was supported by the US Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences, Chemical Sciences, Geosciences, and Biosciences Division.

Native phasing of x-ray free-electron laser data for a G protein-coupled receptor.

PubMed

Batyuk, Alexander; Galli, Lorenzo; Ishchenko, Andrii; Han, Gye Won; Gati, Cornelius; Popov, Petr A; Lee, Ming-Yue; Stauch, Benjamin; White, Thomas A; Barty, Anton; Aquila, Andrew; Hunter, Mark S; Liang, Mengning; Boutet, Sébastien; Pu, Mengchen; Liu, Zhi-Jie; Nelson, Garrett; James, Daniel; Li, Chufeng; Zhao, Yun; Spence, John C H; Liu, Wei; Fromme, Petra; Katritch, Vsevolod; Weierstall, Uwe; Stevens, Raymond C; Cherezov, Vadim

2016-09-01

Serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) takes advantage of extremely bright and ultrashort pulses produced by x-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs), allowing for the collection of high-resolution diffraction intensities from micrometer-sized crystals at room temperature with minimal radiation damage, using the principle of "diffraction-before-destruction." However, de novo structure factor phase determination using XFELs has been difficult so far. We demonstrate the ability to solve the crystallographic phase problem for SFX data collected with an XFEL using the anomalous signal from native sulfur atoms, leading to a bias-free room temperature structure of the human A 2A adenosine receptor at 1.9 Å resolution. The advancement was made possible by recent improvements in SFX data analysis and the design of injectors and delivery media for streaming hydrated microcrystals. This general method should accelerate structural studies of novel difficult-to-crystallize macromolecules and their complexes.

Emerging opportunities in structural biology with X-ray free-electron lasers

PubMed Central

Schlichting, Ilme; Miao, Jianwei

2012-01-01

X-ray free-electron lasers (X-FELs) produce X-ray pulses with extremely brilliant peak intensity and ultrashort pulse duration. It has been proposed that radiation damage can be “outrun” by using an ultra intense and short X-FEL pulse that passes a biological sample before the onset of significant radiation damage. The concept of “diffraction-before-destruction” has been demonstrated recently at the Linac Coherent Light Source, the first operational hard X-ray FEL, for protein nanocrystals and giant virus particles. The continuous diffraction patterns from single particles allow solving the classical “phase problem” by the oversampling method with iterative algorithms. If enough data are collected from many identical copies of a (biological) particle, its three-dimensional structure can be reconstructed. We review the current status and future prospects of serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) and single-particle coherent diffraction imaging (CDI) with X-FELs. PMID:22922042

Sub-micron resolution rf cavity beam position monitor system at the SACLA XFEL facility

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Maesaka, H.; Ego, H.; Inoue, S.; Matsubara, S.; Ohshima, T.; Shintake, T.; Otake, Y.

2012-12-01

We have developed and constructed a C-band (4.760 GHz) rf cavity beam position monitor (RF-BPM) system for the XFEL facility at SPring-8, SACLA. The demanded position resolution of the RF-BPM is less than 1 μm, because an electron beam and x-rays must be overlapped within 4 μm precision in the undulator section for sufficient FEL interaction between the electrons and x-rays. In total, 57 RF-BPMs, including IQ demodulators and high-speed waveform digitizers for signal processing, were produced and installed into SACLA. We evaluated the position resolutions of 20 RF-BPMs in the undulator section by using a 7 GeV electron beam having a 0.1 nC bunch charge. The position resolution was measured to be less than 0.6 μm, which was sufficient for the XFEL lasing in the wavelength region of 0.1 nm, or shorter.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Shenoy, G. K.; Rohlsberger, R.; X-Ray Science Division

From the beginning of its discovery the Moessbauer effect has continued to be one of the most powerful tools with broad applications in diverse areas of science and technology. With the advent of synchrotron radiation sources such as the Advanced Photon Source (APS), the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) and the Super Photon Ring-8 (SPring-8), the tool has enlarged its scope and delivered new capabilities. The popular techniques most generally used in the field of materials physics, chemical physics, geoscience, and biology are hyperfine spectroscopy via elastic nuclear forward scattering (NFS), vibrational spectroscopy via nuclear inelastic scattering (NRIXS), and, tomore » a lesser extent, diffusional dynamics from quasielastic nuclear forward scattering (QNFS). As we look ahead, new storage rings with enhanced brilliance such as PETRA-III under construction at DESY, Hamburg, and PEP-III in its early design stage at SLAC, Stanford, will provide new and unique science opportunities. In the next two decades, x-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs), based both on self-amplified spontaneous emission (SASE-XFELs) and a seed (SXFELs), with unique time structure, coherence and a five to six orders higher average brilliance will truly revolutionize nuclear resonance applications in a major way. This overview is intended to briefly address the unique radiation characteristics of new sources on the horizon and to provide a glimpse of scientific prospects and dreams in the nuclear resonance field from the new radiation sources. We anticipate an expanded nuclear resonance research activity with applications such as spin and phonon mapping of a single nanostructure and their assemblies, interfaces, and surfaces; spin dynamics; nonequilibrium dynamics; photochemical reactions; excited-state spectroscopy; and nonlinear phenomena.« less

X-ray two-photon absorption with high fluence XFEL pulses

DOE PAGES

Hoszowska, Joanna; Szlachetko, J.; Dousse, J. -Cl.; ...

2015-09-07

Here, we report on nonlinear interaction of solid Fe with intense femtosecond hard x-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) pulses. The experiment was performed at the CXI end-station of the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) by means of high- resolution x-ray emission spectroscopy. The focused x-ray beam provided extreme fluence of ~10 5 photons/Å 2. Two-photon absorption leading to K-shell hollow atom formation and to single K-shell ionization of solid Fe was investigated.

Science Driven Instrumentation for LCLS-II

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Arthur, John; Bergmann, Uwe; Brunger, Axel

The world’s first x-ray free electron laser (XFEL), LCLS, has now been operating for more than three years and all six experimental stations are supporting user science and producing high impact scientific results. Other countries are rapidly catching up and a second XFEL, SACLA, is already operating in Japan with others coming on line in Germany, Korea and Switzerland within the next three to five years. In order to increase capability and capacity of LCLS, the Department of Energy has funded LCLS-II.

Curved diamond-crystal spectrographs for x-ray free-electron laser noninvasive diagnostics.

PubMed

Terentyev, Sergey; Blank, Vladimir; Kolodziej, Tomasz; Shvyd'ko, Yuri

2016-12-01

We report on the manufacturing and X-ray tests of bent diamond-crystal X-ray spectrographs, designed for noninvasive diagnostics of the X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) spectra in the spectral range from 5 to 15 keV. The key component is a curved, 20-μm thin, single crystalline diamond triangular plate in the (110) orientation. The radius of curvature can be varied between R = 0.6 m and R = 0.1 m in a controlled fashion, ensuring imaging in a spectral window of up to 60 eV for ≃8 keV X-rays. All of the components of the bending mechanism (about 10 parts) are manufactured from diamond, thus ensuring safe operations in intense XFEL beams. The spectrograph is transparent to 88% for 5-keV photons and to 98% for 15-keV photons. Therefore, it can be used for noninvasive diagnostics of the X-ray spectra during XFEL operations.

Improved crystal orientation and physical properties from single-shot XFEL stills

DOE PAGES

Sauter, Nicholas K.; Hattne, Johan; Brewster, Aaron S.; ...

2014-11-28

X-ray diffraction patterns from still crystals are inherently difficult to process because the crystal orientation is not uniquely determined by measuring the Bragg spot positions. Only one of the three rotational degrees of freedom is directly coupled to spot positions; the other two rotations move Bragg spots in and out of the reflecting condition but do not change the direction of the diffracted rays. This hinders the ability to recover accurate structure factors from experiments that are dependent on single-shot exposures, such as femtosecond diffract-and-destroy protocols at X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs). Here, additional methods are introduced to optimally model themore » diffraction. The best orientation is obtained by requiring, for the brightest observed spots, that each reciprocal-lattice point be placed into the exact reflecting condition implied by Bragg's law with a minimal rotation. This approach reduces the experimental uncertainties in noisy XFEL data, improving the crystallographic R factors and sharpening anomalous differences that are near the level of the noise.« less

Beam-Dynamics Analysis of Long-Range Wakefield Effects on the SCRF Cavities at the Fast Facility

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Shin, Young-Min; Bishofberger, Kip; Carlsten, Bruce

Long-range wakefields in superconducting RF (SCRF) cavities create complicated effects on beam dynamics in SCRF-based FEL beamlines. The driving bunch excites effectively an infinite number of structure modes (including HOMs) which oscillate within the SCRF cavity. Couplers with loads are used to damp the HOMs. However, these HOMs can persist for long periods of time in superconducting structures, which leads to long-range wakefields. Clear understanding of the long-range wakefield effects is a critical element for risk mitigation of future SCRF accelerators such as XFEL at DESY, LCLS-II XFEL, and MaRIE XFEL. We are currently developing numerical tools for simulating long-rangemore » wakefields in SCRF accelerators and plan to experimentally verify the tools by measuring these wakefields at the Fermilab Accelerator Science and Technology (FAST) facility. This paper previews the experimental conditions at the FAST 50 MeV beamline based on the simulation results.« less

Imaging shock waves in diamond with both high temporal and spatial resolution at an XFEL

DOE PAGES

Schropp, Andreas; Hoppe, Robert; Meier, Vivienne; ...

2015-06-18

The advent of hard x-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) has opened up a variety of scientific opportunities in areas as diverse as atomic physics, plasma physics, nonlinear optics in the x-ray range, and protein crystallography. In this article, we access a new field of science by measuring quantitatively the local bulk properties and dynamics of matter under extreme conditions, in this case by using the short XFEL pulse to image an elastic compression wave in diamond. The elastic wave was initiated by an intense optical laser pulse and was imaged at different delay times after the optical pump pulse using magnifiedmore » x-ray phase-contrast imaging. The temporal evolution of the shock wave can be monitored, yielding detailed information on shock dynamics, such as the shock velocity, the shock front width, and the local compression of the material. The method provides a quantitative perspective on the state of matter in extreme conditions.« less

Imaging Shock Waves in Diamond with Both High Temporal and Spatial Resolution at an XFEL.

PubMed

Schropp, Andreas; Hoppe, Robert; Meier, Vivienne; Patommel, Jens; Seiboth, Frank; Ping, Yuan; Hicks, Damien G; Beckwith, Martha A; Collins, Gilbert W; Higginbotham, Andrew; Wark, Justin S; Lee, Hae Ja; Nagler, Bob; Galtier, Eric C; Arnold, Brice; Zastrau, Ulf; Hastings, Jerome B; Schroer, Christian G

2015-06-18

The advent of hard x-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) has opened up a variety of scientific opportunities in areas as diverse as atomic physics, plasma physics, nonlinear optics in the x-ray range, and protein crystallography. In this article, we access a new field of science by measuring quantitatively the local bulk properties and dynamics of matter under extreme conditions, in this case by using the short XFEL pulse to image an elastic compression wave in diamond. The elastic wave was initiated by an intense optical laser pulse and was imaged at different delay times after the optical pump pulse using magnified x-ray phase-contrast imaging. The temporal evolution of the shock wave can be monitored, yielding detailed information on shock dynamics, such as the shock velocity, the shock front width, and the local compression of the material. The method provides a quantitative perspective on the state of matter in extreme conditions.

On the single-photon-counting (SPC) modes of imaging using an XFEL source

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Wang, Zhehui

In this study, the requirements to achieve high detection efficiency (above 50%) and gigahertz (GHz) frame rate for the proposed 42-keV X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) at Los Alamos are summarized. Direct detection scenarios using C (diamond), Si, Ge and GaAs semiconductor sensors are analyzed. Single-photon counting (SPC) mode and weak SPC mode using Si can potentially meet the efficiency and frame rate requirements and be useful to both photoelectric absorption and Compton physics as the photon energy increases. Multilayer three-dimensional (3D) detector architecture, as a possible means to realize SPC modes, is compared with the widely used two-dimensional (2D) hybridmore » planar electrode structure and 3D deeply entrenched electrode architecture. Demonstration of thin film cameras less than 100-μm thick with onboard thin ASICs could be an initial step to realize multilayer 3D detectors and SPC modes for XFELs.« less

Curved diamond-crystal spectrographs for x-ray free-electron laser noninvasive diagnostics

DOE PAGES

Terentyev, Sergey; Blank, Vladimir; Kolodziej, Tomasz; ...

2016-12-29

Here, we report on the manufacturing and X-ray tests of bent diamond-crystal X-ray spectrographs, designed for noninvasive diagnostics of the X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) spectra in the spectral range from 5 to 15 keV. The key component is a curved, 20-µm thin, single crystalline diamond triangular plate in the (110) orientation. The radius of curvature can be varied between R = 0.6 m and R = 0.1 m in a controlled fashion, ensuring imaging in a spectral window of up to 60 eV for ' 8 keV X-rays. All of the components of the bending mechanism (about 10 parts) aremore » manufactured from diamond, thus ensuring safe operations in intense XFEL beams. The spectrograph is transparent to 88% for 5-keV photons, and to 98% for 15-keV photons. Therefore, it can be used for noninvasive diagnostics of the X-ray spectra during XFEL operations.« less

On the single-photon-counting (SPC) modes of imaging using an XFEL source

DOE PAGES

Wang, Zhehui

2015-12-14

In this study, the requirements to achieve high detection efficiency (above 50%) and gigahertz (GHz) frame rate for the proposed 42-keV X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) at Los Alamos are summarized. Direct detection scenarios using C (diamond), Si, Ge and GaAs semiconductor sensors are analyzed. Single-photon counting (SPC) mode and weak SPC mode using Si can potentially meet the efficiency and frame rate requirements and be useful to both photoelectric absorption and Compton physics as the photon energy increases. Multilayer three-dimensional (3D) detector architecture, as a possible means to realize SPC modes, is compared with the widely used two-dimensional (2D) hybridmore » planar electrode structure and 3D deeply entrenched electrode architecture. Demonstration of thin film cameras less than 100-μm thick with onboard thin ASICs could be an initial step to realize multilayer 3D detectors and SPC modes for XFELs.« less

Flow-aligned, single-shot fiber diffraction using a femtosecond X-ray free-electron laser

DOE PAGES

Popp, David; Loh, N. Duane; Zorgati, Habiba; ...

2017-06-02

A major goal for X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) based science is to elucidate structures of biological molecules without the need for crystals. Filament systems may provide some of the first single macromolecular structures elucidated by XFEL radiation, since they contain one-dimensional translational symmetry and thereby occupy the diffraction intensity region between the extremes of crystals and single molecules. Here, we demonstrate flow alignment of as few as 100 filaments ( Escherichia coli pili, F-actin, and amyloid fibrils), which when intersected by femtosecond X-ray pulses result in diffraction patterns similar to those obtained from classical fiber diffraction studies. We also determinemore » that F-actin can be flow-aligned to a disorientation of approximately 5 degrees. Using this XFEL-based technique, we determine that gelsolin amyloids are comprised of stacked β-strands running perpendicular to the filament axis, and that a range of order from fibrillar to crystalline is discernable for individual α-synuclein amyloids.« less

Flow-aligned, single-shot fiber diffraction using a femtosecond X-ray free-electron laser

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Popp, David; Loh, N. Duane; Zorgati, Habiba

A major goal for X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) based science is to elucidate structures of biological molecules without the need for crystals. Filament systems may provide some of the first single macromolecular structures elucidated by XFEL radiation, since they contain one-dimensional translational symmetry and thereby occupy the diffraction intensity region between the extremes of crystals and single molecules. Here, we demonstrate flow alignment of as few as 100 filaments ( Escherichia coli pili, F-actin, and amyloid fibrils), which when intersected by femtosecond X-ray pulses result in diffraction patterns similar to those obtained from classical fiber diffraction studies. We also determinemore » that F-actin can be flow-aligned to a disorientation of approximately 5 degrees. Using this XFEL-based technique, we determine that gelsolin amyloids are comprised of stacked β-strands running perpendicular to the filament axis, and that a range of order from fibrillar to crystalline is discernable for individual α-synuclein amyloids.« less

Two-colour hard X-ray free-electron laser with wide tunability.

PubMed

Hara, Toru; Inubushi, Yuichi; Katayama, Tetsuo; Sato, Takahiro; Tanaka, Hitoshi; Tanaka, Takashi; Togashi, Tadashi; Togawa, Kazuaki; Tono, Kensuke; Yabashi, Makina; Ishikawa, Tetsuya

2013-01-01

Ultrabrilliant, femtosecond X-ray pulses from X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) have promoted the investigation of exotic interactions between intense X-rays and matters, and the observation of minute targets with high spatio-temporal resolution. Although a single X-ray beam has been utilized for these experiments, the use of multiple beams with flexible and optimum beam parameters should drastically enhance the capability and potentiality of XFELs. Here we show a new light source of a two-colour double-pulse (TCDP) XFEL in hard X-rays using variable-gap undulators, which realizes a large and flexible wavelength separation of more than 30% with an ultraprecisely controlled time interval in the attosecond regime. Together with sub-10-fs pulse duration and multi-gigawatt peak powers, the TCDP scheme enables us to elucidate X-ray-induced ultrafast transitions of electronic states and structures, which will significantly contribute to the advancement of ultrafast chemistry, plasma and astronomical physics, and quantum X-ray optics.

Curved diamond-crystal spectrographs for x-ray free-electron laser noninvasive diagnostics

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Terentyev, Sergey; Blank, Vladimir; Kolodziej, Tomasz

Here, we report on the manufacturing and X-ray tests of bent diamond-crystal X-ray spectrographs, designed for noninvasive diagnostics of the X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) spectra in the spectral range from 5 to 15 keV. The key component is a curved, 20-µm thin, single crystalline diamond triangular plate in the (110) orientation. The radius of curvature can be varied between R = 0.6 m and R = 0.1 m in a controlled fashion, ensuring imaging in a spectral window of up to 60 eV for ' 8 keV X-rays. All of the components of the bending mechanism (about 10 parts) aremore » manufactured from diamond, thus ensuring safe operations in intense XFEL beams. The spectrograph is transparent to 88% for 5-keV photons, and to 98% for 15-keV photons. Therefore, it can be used for noninvasive diagnostics of the X-ray spectra during XFEL operations.« less

Improved crystal orientation and physical properties from single-shot XFEL stills

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sauter, Nicholas K.; Hattne, Johan; Brewster, Aaron S.

X-ray diffraction patterns from still crystals are inherently difficult to process because the crystal orientation is not uniquely determined by measuring the Bragg spot positions. Only one of the three rotational degrees of freedom is directly coupled to spot positions; the other two rotations move Bragg spots in and out of the reflecting condition but do not change the direction of the diffracted rays. This hinders the ability to recover accurate structure factors from experiments that are dependent on single-shot exposures, such as femtosecond diffract-and-destroy protocols at X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs). Here, additional methods are introduced to optimally model themore » diffraction. The best orientation is obtained by requiring, for the brightest observed spots, that each reciprocal-lattice point be placed into the exact reflecting condition implied by Bragg's law with a minimal rotation. This approach reduces the experimental uncertainties in noisy XFEL data, improving the crystallographic R factors and sharpening anomalous differences that are near the level of the noise.« less

Fresh-slice multicolour X-ray free-electron lasers

DOE PAGES

Lutman, Alberto A.; Maxwell, Timothy J.; MacArthur, James P.; ...

2016-10-24

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) provide femtosecond X-ray pulses with a narrow energy bandwidth and unprecedented brightness. Ultrafast physical and chemical dynamics, initiated with a site-specific X-ray pulse, can be explored using XFELs with a second ultrashort X-ray probe pulse. However, existing double-pulse schemes are complicated, difficult to customize or provide only low-intensity pulses. Here we present the novel fresh-slice technique for multicolour pulse production, wherein different temporal slices of an electron bunch lase to saturation in separate undulator sections. This method combines electron bunch tailoring from a passive wakefield device with trajectory control to provide multicolour pulses. The fresh-slice schememore » outperforms existing techniques at soft X-ray wavelengths. It produces femtosecond pulses with a power of tens of gigawatts and flexible colour separation. The pulse delay can be varied from temporal overlap to almost one picosecond. As a result, we also demonstrate the first three-colour XFEL and variably polarized two-colour pulses.« less

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Gati, Cornelius; Oberthuer, Dominik; Yefanov, Oleksandr

To understand how molecules function in biological systems, new methods are required to obtain atomic resolution structures from biological material under physiological conditions. Intense femtosecond-duration pulses from X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) can outrun most damage processes, vastly increasing the tolerable dose before the specimen is destroyed. This in turn allows structure determination from crystals much smaller and more radiation sensitive than previously considered possible, allowing data collection from room temperature structures and avoiding structural changes due to cooling. Regardless, high-resolution structures obtained from XFEL data mostly use crystals far larger than 1 μm3 in volume, whereas the X-ray beam ismore » often attenuated to protect the detector from damage caused by intense Bragg spots. Here, we describe the 2 Å resolution structure of native nanocrystalline granulovirus occlusion bodies (OBs) that are less than 0.016 μm3 in volume using the full power of the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) and a dose up to 1.3 GGy per crystal. The crystalline shell of granulovirus OBs consists, on average, of about 9,000 unit cells, representing the smallest protein crystals to yield a high-resolution structure by X-ray crystallography to date. The XFEL structure shows little to no evidence of radiation damage and is more complete than a model determined using synchrotron data from recombinantly produced, much larger, cryocooled granulovirus granulin microcrystals. Furthermore, our measurements suggest that it should be possible, under ideal experimental conditions, to obtain data from protein crystals with only 100 unit cells in volume using currently available XFELs and suggest that single-molecule imaging of individual biomolecules could almost be within reach.« less

Mapping the conformational landscape of a dynamic enzyme by multitemperature and XFEL crystallography

DOE PAGES

Keedy, Daniel A.; Kenner, Lillian R.; Warkentin, Matthew; ...

2015-09-30

Determining the interconverting conformations of dynamic proteins in atomic detail is a major challenge for structural biology. Conformational heterogeneity in the active site of the dynamic enzyme cyclophilin A (CypA) has been previously linked to its catalytic function, but the extent to which the different conformations of these residues are correlated is unclear. Here we compare the conformational ensembles of CypA by multitemperature synchrotron crystallography and fixed-target X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) crystallography. The diffraction-before-destruction nature of XFEL experiments provides a radiation-damage-free view of the functionally important alternative conformations of CypA, confirming earlier synchrotron-based results. We monitored the temperature dependences ofmore » these alternative conformations with eight synchrotron datasets spanning 100-310 K. Multiconformer models show that many alternative conformations in CypA are populated only at 240 K and above, yet others remain populated or become populated at 180 K and below. These results point to a complex evolution of conformational heterogeneity between 180-–240 K that involves both thermal deactivation and solvent-driven arrest of protein motions in the crystal. The lack of a single shared conformational response to temperature within the dynamic active-site network provides evidence for a conformation shuffling model, in which exchange between rotamer states of a large aromatic ring in the middle of the network shifts the conformational ensemble for the other residues in the network. Altogether, our multitemperature analyses and XFEL data motivate a new generation of temperature- and time-resolved experiments to structurally characterize the dynamic underpinnings of protein function.« less

Mapping the conformational landscape of a dynamic enzyme by multitemperature and XFEL crystallography

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Keedy, Daniel A.; Kenner, Lillian R.; Warkentin, Matthew

Determining the interconverting conformations of dynamic proteins in atomic detail is a major challenge for structural biology. Conformational heterogeneity in the active site of the dynamic enzyme cyclophilin A (CypA) has been previously linked to its catalytic function, but the extent to which the different conformations of these residues are correlated is unclear. Here we compare the conformational ensembles of CypA by multitemperature synchrotron crystallography and fixed-target X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) crystallography. The diffraction-before-destruction nature of XFEL experiments provides a radiation-damage-free view of the functionally important alternative conformations of CypA, confirming earlier synchrotron-based results. We monitored the temperature dependences ofmore » these alternative conformations with eight synchrotron datasets spanning 100-310 K. Multiconformer models show that many alternative conformations in CypA are populated only at 240 K and above, yet others remain populated or become populated at 180 K and below. These results point to a complex evolution of conformational heterogeneity between 180-–240 K that involves both thermal deactivation and solvent-driven arrest of protein motions in the crystal. The lack of a single shared conformational response to temperature within the dynamic active-site network provides evidence for a conformation shuffling model, in which exchange between rotamer states of a large aromatic ring in the middle of the network shifts the conformational ensemble for the other residues in the network. Together, our multitemperature analyses and XFEL data motivate a new generation of temperature- and time-resolved experiments to structurally characterize the dynamic underpinnings of protein function.« less

Mapping the conformational landscape of a dynamic enzyme by multitemperature and XFEL crystallography

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Keedy, Daniel A.; Kenner, Lillian R.; Warkentin, Matthew

Determining the interconverting conformations of dynamic proteins in atomic detail is a major challenge for structural biology. Conformational heterogeneity in the active site of the dynamic enzyme cyclophilin A (CypA) has been previously linked to its catalytic function, but the extent to which the different conformations of these residues are correlated is unclear. Here we compare the conformational ensembles of CypA by multitemperature synchrotron crystallography and fixed-target X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) crystallography. The diffraction-before-destruction nature of XFEL experiments provides a radiation-damage-free view of the functionally important alternative conformations of CypA, confirming earlier synchrotron-based results. We monitored the temperature dependences ofmore » these alternative conformations with eight synchrotron datasets spanning 100-310 K. Multiconformer models show that many alternative conformations in CypA are populated only at 240 K and above, yet others remain populated or become populated at 180 K and below. These results point to a complex evolution of conformational heterogeneity between 180-–240 K that involves both thermal deactivation and solvent-driven arrest of protein motions in the crystal. The lack of a single shared conformational response to temperature within the dynamic active-site network provides evidence for a conformation shuffling model, in which exchange between rotamer states of a large aromatic ring in the middle of the network shifts the conformational ensemble for the other residues in the network. Altogether, our multitemperature analyses and XFEL data motivate a new generation of temperature- and time-resolved experiments to structurally characterize the dynamic underpinnings of protein function.« less

Modeling the gain of inner-shell X-ray laser transitions in neon, argon, and copper driven by X-ray free electron laser radiation using photo-ionization and photo-excitation processes

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Nilsen, Joseph

2015-12-16

Using an X-ray free electron laser (XFEL) at 960 eV to photo-ionize the 1s electron in neutral neon followed by lasing on the 2p-1s transition in singly-ionized neon, an inner-shell X-ray laser was demonstrated at 849 eV in singly-ionized neon gas several years ago. It took decades to demonstrate this scheme, because it required a very strong X-ray source that could photo-ionize the 1s (K shell) electron in neon on a timescale comparable to the intrinsic Auger lifetime in neon of 2 fs. In this paper, we model the neon inner shell X-ray laser under similar conditions to those usedmore » in the XFEL experiments at the SLAC Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS), and show how we can improve the efficiency of the neon laser and reduce the drive requirements by tuning the XFEL to the 1s-3p transition in neutral neon in order to create gain on the 2p-1s line in neutral neon. We also show how the XFEL could be used to photo-ionize L-shell electrons to drive gain on n = 3–2 transitions in singly-ionized Ar and Cu plasmas. Furthermore, these bright, coherent, and monochromatic X-ray lasers may prove very useful for doing high-resolution spectroscopy and for studying non-linear process in the X-ray regime.« less

Characterisation of the high dynamic range Large Pixel Detector (LPD) and its use at X-ray free electron laser sources

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Veale, M. C.; Adkin, P.; Booker, P.; Coughlan, J.; French, M. J.; Hart, M.; Nicholls, T.; Schneider, A.; Seller, P.; Pape, I.; Sawhney, K.; Carini, G. A.; Hart, P. A.

2017-12-01

The STFC Rutherford Appleton Laboratory have delivered the Large Pixel Detector (LPD) for MHz frame rate imaging at the European XFEL. The detector system has an active area of 0.5 m × 0.5 m and consists of a million pixels on a 500 μm pitch. Sensors have been produced from 500 μm thick Hammamatsu silicon tiles that have been bump bonded to the readout ASIC using a silver epoxy and gold stud technique. Each pixel of the detector system is capable of measuring 105 12 keV photons per image readout at 4.5 MHz. In this paper results from the testing of these detectors at the Diamond Light Source and the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) are presented. The performance of the detector in terms of linearity, spatial uniformity and the performance of the different ASIC gain stages is characterised.

Time-resolved structural studies with serial crystallography: A new light on retinal proteins

PubMed Central

Panneels, Valérie; Wu, Wenting; Tsai, Ching-Ju; Nogly, Przemek; Rheinberger, Jan; Jaeger, Kathrin; Cicchetti, Gregor; Gati, Cornelius; Kick, Leonhard M.; Sala, Leonardo; Capitani, Guido; Milne, Chris; Padeste, Celestino; Pedrini, Bill; Li, Xiao-Dan; Standfuss, Jörg; Abela, Rafael; Schertler, Gebhard

2015-01-01

Structural information of the different conformational states of the two prototypical light-sensitive membrane proteins, bacteriorhodopsin and rhodopsin, has been obtained in the past by X-ray cryo-crystallography and cryo-electron microscopy. However, these methods do not allow for the structure determination of most intermediate conformations. Recently, the potential of X-Ray Free Electron Lasers (X-FELs) for tracking the dynamics of light-triggered processes by pump-probe serial femtosecond crystallography has been demonstrated using 3D-micron-sized crystals. In addition, X-FELs provide new opportunities for protein 2D-crystal diffraction, which would allow to observe the course of conformational changes of membrane proteins in a close-to-physiological lipid bilayer environment. Here, we describe the strategies towards structural dynamic studies of retinal proteins at room temperature, using injector or fixed-target based serial femtosecond crystallography at X-FELs. Thanks to recent progress especially in sample delivery methods, serial crystallography is now also feasible at synchrotron X-ray sources, thus expanding the possibilities for time-resolved structure determination. PMID:26798817

Isolated terawatt attosecond hard X-ray pulse generated from single current spike.

PubMed

Shim, Chi Hyun; Parc, Yong Woon; Kumar, Sandeep; Ko, In Soo; Kim, Dong Eon

2018-05-10

Isolated terawatt (TW) attosecond (as) hard X-ray pulse is greatly desired for four-dimensional investigations of natural phenomena with picometer spatial and attosecond temporal resolutions. Since the demand for such sources is continuously increasing, the possibility of generating such pulse by a single current spike without the use of optical or electron delay units in an undulator line is addressed. The conditions of a current spike (width and height) and a modulation laser pulse (wavelength and power) is also discussed. We demonstrate that an isolated TW-level as a hard X-ray can be produced by a properly chosen single current spike in an electron bunch with simulation results. By using realistic specifications of an electron bunch of the Pohang Accelerator Laboratory X-ray Free-Electron Laser (PAL-XFEL), we show that an isolated, >1.0 TW and ~36 as X-ray pulse at 12.4 keV can be generated in an optimized-tapered undulator line. This result opens a new vista for current XFEL operation: the attosecond XFEL.

Fluence thresholds for grazing incidence hard x-ray mirrors

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Aquila, A.; Ozkan, C.; Sinn, H.

2015-06-15

X-ray Free Electron Lasers (XFELs) have the potential to contribute to many fields of science and to enable many new avenues of research, in large part due to their orders of magnitude higher peak brilliance than existing and future synchrotrons. To best exploit this peak brilliance, these XFEL beams need to be focused to appropriate spot sizes. However, the survivability of X-ray optical components in these intense, femtosecond radiation conditions is not guaranteed. As mirror optics are routinely used at XFEL facilities, a physical understanding of the interaction between intense X-ray pulses and grazing incidence X-ray optics is desirable. Wemore » conducted single shot damage threshold fluence measurements on grazing incidence X-ray optics, with coatings of ruthenium and boron carbide, at the SPring-8 Angstrom compact free electron laser facility using 7 and 12 keV photon energies. The damage threshold dose limits were found to be orders of magnitude higher than would naively be expected. The incorporation of energy transport and dissipation via keV level energetic photoelectrons accounts for the observed damage threshold.« less

MaRIE X-Ray Free-Electron Laser Pre-Conceptual Design

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Carlsten, Bruce E.; Barnes, Cris W.; Bishofberger, Kip A.

2011-01-01

The proposed Matter-Radiation Interactions in Extremes (MaRIE) facility at the Los Alamos National Laboratory will include a 50-keV X-Ray Free-Electron Laser (XFEL), a significant extension from planned and existing XFEL facilities. To prevent an unacceptably large energy spread arsing from energy diffusion, the electron beam energy should not exceed 20 GeV, which puts a significant constraint on the beam emittance. A 100-pC baseline design is presented along with advanced technology options to increase the photon flux and to decrease the spectral bandwidth through pre-bunching the electron beam.

Protein crystal screening and characterization for serial femtosecond nanocrystallography

PubMed Central

Darmanin, Connie; Strachan, Jamie; Adda, Christopher G.; Ve, Thomas; Kobe, Bostjan; Abbey, Brian

2016-01-01

The recent development of X-ray free electron lasers (XFELs) has spurred the development of serial femtosecond nanocrystallography (SFX) which, for the first time, is enabling structure retrieval from sub-micron protein crystals. Although there are already a growing number of structures published using SFX, the technology is still very new and presents a number of unique challenges as well as opportunities for structural biologists. One of the biggest barriers to the success of SFX experiments is the preparation and selection of suitable protein crystal samples. Here we outline a protocol for preparing and screening for suitable XFEL targets. PMID:27139248

Atomic structure of granulin determined from native nanocrystalline granulovirus using an X-ray free-electron laser

PubMed Central

Gati, Cornelius; Oberthuer, Dominik; Yefanov, Oleksandr; Stellato, Francesco; Chiu, Elaine; Yeh, Shin-Mei; Aquila, Andrew; Basu, Shibom; Bean, Richard; Beyerlein, Kenneth R.; Botha, Sabine; Boutet, Sébastien; DePonte, Daniel P.; Doak, R. Bruce; Fromme, Raimund; Galli, Lorenzo; Grotjohann, Ingo; James, Daniel R.; Kupitz, Christopher; Lomb, Lukas; Messerschmidt, Marc; Nass, Karol; Rendek, Kimberly; Shoeman, Robert L.; Wang, Dingjie; Weierstall, Uwe; White, Thomas A.; Williams, Garth J.; Zatsepin, Nadia A.; Fromme, Petra; Spence, John C. H.; Goldie, Kenneth N.; Jehle, Johannes A.; Metcalf, Peter; Barty, Anton

2017-01-01

To understand how molecules function in biological systems, new methods are required to obtain atomic resolution structures from biological material under physiological conditions. Intense femtosecond-duration pulses from X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) can outrun most damage processes, vastly increasing the tolerable dose before the specimen is destroyed. This in turn allows structure determination from crystals much smaller and more radiation sensitive than previously considered possible, allowing data collection from room temperature structures and avoiding structural changes due to cooling. Regardless, high-resolution structures obtained from XFEL data mostly use crystals far larger than 1 μm3 in volume, whereas the X-ray beam is often attenuated to protect the detector from damage caused by intense Bragg spots. Here, we describe the 2 Å resolution structure of native nanocrystalline granulovirus occlusion bodies (OBs) that are less than 0.016 μm3 in volume using the full power of the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) and a dose up to 1.3 GGy per crystal. The crystalline shell of granulovirus OBs consists, on average, of about 9,000 unit cells, representing the smallest protein crystals to yield a high-resolution structure by X-ray crystallography to date. The XFEL structure shows little to no evidence of radiation damage and is more complete than a model determined using synchrotron data from recombinantly produced, much larger, cryocooled granulovirus granulin microcrystals. Our measurements suggest that it should be possible, under ideal experimental conditions, to obtain data from protein crystals with only 100 unit cells in volume using currently available XFELs and suggest that single-molecule imaging of individual biomolecules could almost be within reach. PMID:28202732

Mapping the conformational landscape of a dynamic enzyme by multitemperature and XFEL crystallography

PubMed Central

Keedy, Daniel A; Kenner, Lillian R; Warkentin, Matthew; Woldeyes, Rahel A; Hopkins, Jesse B; Thompson, Michael C; Brewster, Aaron S; Van Benschoten, Andrew H; Baxter, Elizabeth L; Uervirojnangkoorn, Monarin; McPhillips, Scott E; Song, Jinhu; Alonso-Mori, Roberto; Holton, James M; Weis, William I; Brunger, Axel T; Soltis, S Michael; Lemke, Henrik; Gonzalez, Ana; Sauter, Nicholas K; Cohen, Aina E; van den Bedem, Henry; Thorne, Robert E; Fraser, James S

2015-01-01

Determining the interconverting conformations of dynamic proteins in atomic detail is a major challenge for structural biology. Conformational heterogeneity in the active site of the dynamic enzyme cyclophilin A (CypA) has been previously linked to its catalytic function, but the extent to which the different conformations of these residues are correlated is unclear. Here we compare the conformational ensembles of CypA by multitemperature synchrotron crystallography and fixed-target X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) crystallography. The diffraction-before-destruction nature of XFEL experiments provides a radiation-damage-free view of the functionally important alternative conformations of CypA, confirming earlier synchrotron-based results. We monitored the temperature dependences of these alternative conformations with eight synchrotron datasets spanning 100-310 K. Multiconformer models show that many alternative conformations in CypA are populated only at 240 K and above, yet others remain populated or become populated at 180 K and below. These results point to a complex evolution of conformational heterogeneity between 180-–240 K that involves both thermal deactivation and solvent-driven arrest of protein motions in the crystal. The lack of a single shared conformational response to temperature within the dynamic active-site network provides evidence for a conformation shuffling model, in which exchange between rotamer states of a large aromatic ring in the middle of the network shifts the conformational ensemble for the other residues in the network. Together, our multitemperature analyses and XFEL data motivate a new generation of temperature- and time-resolved experiments to structurally characterize the dynamic underpinnings of protein function. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.07574.001 PMID:26422513

Atomic structure of granulin determined from native nanocrystalline granulovirus using an X-ray free-electron laser

DOE PAGES

Gati, Cornelius; Oberthuer, Dominik; Yefanov, Oleksandr; ...

2017-02-15

To understand how molecules function in biological systems, new methods are required to obtain atomic resolution structures from biological material under physiological conditions. Intense femtosecond-duration pulses from X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) can outrun most damage processes, vastly increasing the tolerable dose before the specimen is destroyed. This in turn allows structure determination from crystals much smaller and more radiation sensitive than previously considered possible, allowing data collection from room temperature structures and avoiding structural changes due to cooling. Regardless, high-resolution structures obtained from XFEL data mostly use crystals far larger than 1 μm3 in volume, whereas the X-ray beam ismore » often attenuated to protect the detector from damage caused by intense Bragg spots. Here, we describe the 2 Å resolution structure of native nanocrystalline granulovirus occlusion bodies (OBs) that are less than 0.016 μm3 in volume using the full power of the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) and a dose up to 1.3 GGy per crystal. The crystalline shell of granulovirus OBs consists, on average, of about 9,000 unit cells, representing the smallest protein crystals to yield a high-resolution structure by X-ray crystallography to date. The XFEL structure shows little to no evidence of radiation damage and is more complete than a model determined using synchrotron data from recombinantly produced, much larger, cryocooled granulovirus granulin microcrystals. Furthermore, our measurements suggest that it should be possible, under ideal experimental conditions, to obtain data from protein crystals with only 100 unit cells in volume using currently available XFELs and suggest that single-molecule imaging of individual biomolecules could almost be within reach.« less

Layout of bunch compressor for Beijing XFEL test facility

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhu, Xiongwei; Du, Yingchao; He, Xiaozhong; Yang, Yufeng

2006-10-01

In this paper, we describe the layout of the bunch compressor for the Beijing XFEL test facility (BTF). Our bunch compressor setup is different from the usual one due to the space limit. The compensation X-BAND cavity and the first bunch compressor are separate in distance. The electron bunch is decelerated first and then accelerated to enter the first bunch compressor. The simulation result shows that our setup works well, and the nonlinear term is well compensated. Also, we present the result about the CSR emittance dilution study. Finally, we develop a program to study microbunch instability in the second BTF bunch compressor.

7 Å Resolution in Protein 2-Dimentional-Crystal X-Ray Diffraction at Linac Coherent Light Source

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Pedrini, Bill; Tsai, Ching-Ju; Capitani, Guido

2014-06-09

Membrane proteins arranged as two-dimensional (2D) crystals in the lipid en- vironment provide close-to-physiological structural information, which is essential for understanding the molecular mechanisms of protein function. X-ray diffraction from individual 2D crystals did not represent a suitable investigation tool because of radiation damage. The recent availability of ultrashort pulses from X-ray Free Electron Lasers (X-FELs) has now provided a mean to outrun the damage. Here we report on measurements performed at the LCLS X-FEL on bacteriorhodopsin 2D crystals mounted on a solid support and kept at room temperature. By merg- ing data from about a dozen of single crystalmore » diffraction images, we unambiguously identified the diffraction peaks to a resolution of 7 °A, thus improving the observable resolution with respect to that achievable from a single pattern alone. This indicates that a larger dataset will allow for reliable quantification of peak intensities, and in turn a corresponding increase of resolution. The presented results pave the way to further X-FEL studies on 2D crystals, which may include pump-probe experiments at subpicosecond time resolution.« less

Kinetic Modeling of Ultraintense X-ray Laser-Matter Interactions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Royle, Ryan; Sentoku, Yasuhiko; Mancini, Roberto

2016-10-01

Hard x-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) have had a profound impact on the physical, chemical, and biological sciences. They can produce millijoule x-ray laser pulses just tens of femtoseconds in duration with more than 1012 photons each, making them the brightest laboratory x-ray sources ever produced by several orders of magnitude. An XFEL pulse can be intensified to 1020 W/cm2 when focused to submicron spot sizes, making it possible to isochorically heat solid matter well beyond 100 eV. These characteristics enable XFELs to create and probe well-characterized warm and hot dense plasmas of relevance to HED science, planetary science, laboratory astrophysics, relativistic laser plasmas, and fusion research. Several newly developed atomic physics models including photoionization, Auger ionization, and continuum-lowering have been implemented in a particle-in-cell code, PICLS, which self-consistently solves the x-ray transport, to enable the simulation of the non-LTE plasmas created by ultraintense x-ray laser interactions with solid density matter. The code is validated against the results of several recent experiments and is used to simulate the maximum-intensity x-ray heating of solid iron targets. This work was supported by DOE/OFES under Contract No. DE-SC0008827.

Improved crystal orientation and physical properties from single-shot XFEL stills

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sauter, Nicholas K., E-mail: nksauter@lbl.gov; Hattne, Johan; Brewster, Aaron S.

X-ray free-electron laser crystallography relies on the collection of still-shot diffraction patterns. New methods are developed for optimal modeling of the crystals’ orientations and mosaic block properties. X-ray diffraction patterns from still crystals are inherently difficult to process because the crystal orientation is not uniquely determined by measuring the Bragg spot positions. Only one of the three rotational degrees of freedom is directly coupled to spot positions; the other two rotations move Bragg spots in and out of the reflecting condition but do not change the direction of the diffracted rays. This hinders the ability to recover accurate structure factorsmore » from experiments that are dependent on single-shot exposures, such as femtosecond diffract-and-destroy protocols at X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs). Here, additional methods are introduced to optimally model the diffraction. The best orientation is obtained by requiring, for the brightest observed spots, that each reciprocal-lattice point be placed into the exact reflecting condition implied by Bragg’s law with a minimal rotation. This approach reduces the experimental uncertainties in noisy XFEL data, improving the crystallographic R factors and sharpening anomalous differences that are near the level of the noise.« less

Stimulated resonant x-ray Raman scattering with incoherent radiation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Weninger, Clemens; Rohringer, Nina

2013-11-01

We present a theoretical study on stimulated electronic Raman scattering in neon by resonant excitation with an x-ray free electron laser (XFEL). This study is in support of the recent experimental demonstration [C. Weninger , Phys. Rev. Lett. (to be published)] of stimulated x-ray Raman scattering. Focusing the broadband XFEL pulses into a cell of neon gas at atmospheric pressure a strong inelastic x-ray scattering signal in the forward direction was observed, as the x-ray energy was varied across the region of core-excited Rydberg states and the K edge. The broadband and intrinsically incoherent x-ray pulses from the XFEL lead to a rich, structured line shape of the scattered radiation. We present a generalized Maxwell-Liouville-von Neumann approach to self-consistently solve for the amplification of the scattered radiation along with the time evolution of the density matrix of the atomic and residual ionic system. An in-depth analysis of the evolution of the emission spectra as a function of the Raman gain is presented. Furthermore, we propose the use of statistical methods to obtain high-resolution scattering data beyond the lifetime broadening despite pumping with incoherent x-ray pulses.

Kinetic Modeling of Ultraintense X-Ray Laser-Matter Interactions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Royle, Ryan; Sentoku, Yasuhiko; Mancini, Roberto; Johzaki, Tomoyuki

2015-11-01

High-intensity XFELs have become a novel way of creating and studying hot dense plasmas. The LCLS at Stanford can deliver a millijoule of energy with more than 1012 photons in a ~ 100 femtosecond pulse. By tightly focusing the beam to a micron-scale spot size, the XFEL can be intensified to more than 1018 W/cm2, making it possible to heat solid matter isochorically beyond a million degrees (>100 eV). Such extreme states of matter are of considerable interest due to their relevance to astrophysical plasmas. Additionally, they will allow novel ways of studying equation-of-state and opacity physics under Gbar pressure and strong fields. Photoionization is the dominant x-ray absorption mechanism and triggers the heating processes. A photoionization model that takes into account the subshell cross-sections has been developed in a kinetic plasma simulation code, PICLS, that solves the x-ray transport self-consistently. The XFEL-matter interaction with several elements, including solid carbon, aluminum, and iron, is studied with the code, and the results are compared with recent LCLS experiments. This work was supported by the DOE/OFES under Contract No. DE-SC0008827.

7 Å resolution in protein two-dimensional-crystal X-ray diffraction at Linac Coherent Light Source

PubMed Central

Pedrini, Bill; Tsai, Ching-Ju; Capitani, Guido; Padeste, Celestino; Hunter, Mark S.; Zatsepin, Nadia A.; Barty, Anton; Benner, W. Henry; Boutet, Sébastien; Feld, Geoffrey K.; Hau-Riege, Stefan P.; Kirian, Richard A.; Kupitz, Christopher; Messerschmitt, Marc; Ogren, John I.; Pardini, Tommaso; Segelke, Brent; Williams, Garth J.; Spence, John C. H.; Abela, Rafael; Coleman, Matthew; Evans, James E.; Schertler, Gebhard F. X.; Frank, Matthias; Li, Xiao-Dan

2014-01-01

Membrane proteins arranged as two-dimensional crystals in the lipid environment provide close-to-physiological structural information, which is essential for understanding the molecular mechanisms of protein function. Previously, X-ray diffraction from individual two-dimensional crystals did not represent a suitable investigational tool because of radiation damage. The recent availability of ultrashort pulses from X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) has now provided a means to outrun the damage. Here, we report on measurements performed at the Linac Coherent Light Source XFEL on bacteriorhodopsin two-dimensional crystals mounted on a solid support and kept at room temperature. By merging data from about a dozen single crystal diffraction images, we unambiguously identified the diffraction peaks to a resolution of 7 Å, thus improving the observable resolution with respect to that achievable from a single pattern alone. This indicates that a larger dataset will allow for reliable quantification of peak intensities, and in turn a corresponding increase in the resolution. The presented results pave the way for further XFEL studies on two-dimensional crystals, which may include pump–probe experiments at subpicosecond time resolution. PMID:24914166

Mechanical design of thin-film diamond crystal mounting apparatus for coherence preservation hard x-ray optics

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Shu, Deming, E-mail: shu@aps.anl.gov; Shvyd’ko, Yuri V.; Stoupin, Stanislav

2016-07-27

A new thin-film diamond crystal mounting apparatus has been designed at the Advanced Photon Source (APS) for coherence preservation hard x-ray optics with optimized thermal contact and minimized crystal strain. This novel mechanical design can be applied to new development in the field of: x-ray optics cavities for hard x-ray free-electron laser oscillators (XFELOs), self-seeding monochromators for hard x-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) with high average thermal loading, high heat load diamond crystal monochromators and beam-sharing/beam-split-and-delay devices for XFEL facilities and future upgraded high-brightness coherent x-ray source in the MBA lattice configuration at the APS.

XFEL OSCILLATOR SIMULATION INCLUDING ANGLE-DEPENDENT CRYSTAL REFLECTIVITY

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Fawley, William; Lindberg, Ryan; Kim, K-J

The oscillator package within the GINGER FEL simulation code has now been extended to include angle-dependent reflectivity properties of Bragg crystals. Previously, the package was modified to include frequencydependent reflectivity in order to model x-ray FEL oscillators from start-up from shot noise through to saturation. We present a summary of the algorithms used for modeling the crystal reflectivity and radiation propagation outside the undulator, discussing various numerical issues relevant to the domain of high Fresnel number and efficient Hankel transforms. We give some sample XFEL-O simulation results obtained with the angle-dependent reflectivity model, with particular attention directed to the longitudinalmore » and transverse coherence of the radiation output.« less

PREFACE: REXS 2013 - Workshop on Resonant Elastic X-ray Scattering in Condensed Matter

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Beutier, G.; Mazzoli, C.; Yakhou, F.; Brown, S. D.; Bombardi, A.; Collins, S. P.

2014-05-01

The aim of this workshop was to bring together experts in experimental and theoretical aspects of resonant elastic x-ray scattering, along with researchers who are new to the field, to discuss important recent results and the fundamentals of the technique. The meeting was a great success, with the first day dedicated to students and new researchers in the field, who received introductory lectures and tutorials. All conference delegates were invited either to make an oral presentation or to present a poster, accompanied by a short talk. The first two papers selected for the REXS13 proceedings (Grenier & Joly and Helliwell) give a basic background to the theory of REXS and applications across a wide range of scientific areas. The remainder of the papers report on some of the latest scientific results obtained by applying the REXS technique to contemporary problems in condensed matter, materials and x-ray physics. It is hoped that these proceedings provide a snapshot of the current status of a vibrant and diverse scientific technique that will be of value not just to those who attended the workshop but also to any other reader with an interest in the subject. Local Scientific Committee REXS13 International Scientific Advisory Committee M Altarelli, European XFEL, Germany F de Bergevin, European Synchrotron Radiation Facility, France J Garcia-Ruiz, Universidad de Zaragoza, Spain A I Goldman, Iowa State University, USA M Goldmann, Institut Nanosciences, France T Schulli, European Synchrotron Radiation Facility, France C R Natoli, Laboratori Nazionali de Frascati, Italy G Materlik, Diamond Light Source, UK L Paolasini, European Synchrotron Radiation Facility, France U Staub, Paul Scherrer Institut, Switzerland K Finkelstein, Cornell University, USA Y Murakami, Photon Factory, Japan REXS13 Local Scientific Committee G Beutier, CNRS Grenoble, France C Mazzoli, Politecnico di Milano, Italy F Yakhou, European Synchrotron Radiation Facility, France S D Brown, XMaS UK CRG, France A Bombardi, Diamond Light Source, UK S P Collins, Diamond Light Source, UK http://www.rexs2013.org/

Improvements in serial femtosecond crystallography of photosystem II by optimizing crystal uniformity using microseeding procedures

DOE PAGES

Ibrahim, Mohamed; Chatterjee, Ruchira; Hellmich, Julia; ...

2015-07-01

In photosynthesis, photosystem II (PSII) is the multi-subunit membrane protein complex that catalyzes photo-oxidation of water into dioxygen through the oxygen evolving complex (OEC). To understand the water oxidation reaction, it is important to get structural information about the transient and intermediate states of the OEC in the dimeric PSII core complex (dPSIIcc). In recent times, femtosecond X-ray pulses from the free electron laser (XFEL) are being used to obtain X-ray diffraction (XRD) data of dPSIIcc microcrystals at room temperature that are free of radiation damage. In our experiments at the XFEL, we used an electrospun liquid microjet setup thatmore » requires microcrystals less than 40 μm in size. In this study, we explored various microseeding techniques to get a high yield of monodisperse uniform-sized microcrystals. Monodisperse microcrystals of dPSIIcc of uniform size were a key to improve the stability of the jet and the quality of XRD data obtained at the XFEL. This was evident by an improvement of the quality of the datasets obtained, from 6.5 Å, using crystals grown without the micro seeding approach, to 4.5 Å using crystals generated with the new method.« less

Asymmetry in serial femtosecond crystallography data.

PubMed

Sharma, Amit; Johansson, Linda; Dunevall, Elin; Wahlgren, Weixiao Y; Neutze, Richard; Katona, Gergely

2017-03-01

Serial crystallography is an increasingly important approach to protein crystallography that exploits both X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) and synchrotron radiation. Serial crystallography recovers complete X-ray diffraction data by processing and merging diffraction images from thousands of randomly oriented non-uniform microcrystals, of which all observations are partial Bragg reflections. Random fluctuations in the XFEL pulse energy spectrum, variations in the size and shape of microcrystals, integrating over millions of weak partial observations and instabilities in the XFEL beam position lead to new types of experimental errors. The quality of Bragg intensity estimates deriving from serial crystallography is therefore contingent upon assumptions made while modeling these data. Here it is observed that serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) Bragg reflections do not follow a unimodal Gaussian distribution and it is recommended that an idealized assumption of single Gaussian peak profiles be relaxed to incorporate apparent asymmetries when processing SFX data. The phenomenon is illustrated by re-analyzing data collected from microcrystals of the Blastochloris viridis photosynthetic reaction center and comparing these intensity observations with conventional synchrotron data. The results show that skewness in the SFX observations captures the essence of the Wilson plot and an empirical treatment is suggested that can help to separate the diffraction Bragg intensity from the background.

Characterisation of the high dynamic range Large Pixel Detector (LPD) and its use at X-ray free electron laser sources

DOE PAGES

Veale, M. C.; Adkin, P.; Booker, P.; ...

2017-12-04

The STFC Rutherford Appleton Laboratory have delivered the Large Pixel Detector (LPD) for MHz frame rate imaging at the European XFEL. The detector system has an active area of 0.5 m × 0.5 m and consists of a million pixels on a 500 μm pitch. Sensors have been produced from 500 μm thick Hammamatsu silicon tiles that have been bump bonded to the readout ASIC using a silver epoxy and gold stud technique. Each pixel of the detector system is capable of measuring 10 5 12 keV photons per image readout at 4.5 MHz. In this paper results from themore » testing of these detectors at the Diamond Light Source and the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) are presented. As a result, the performance of the detector in terms of linearity, spatial uniformity and the performance of the different ASIC gain stages is characterised.« less

Efficient model for low-energy transverse beam dynamics in a nine-cell 1.3 GHz cavity

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hellert, Thorsten; Dohlus, Martin; Decking, Winfried

2017-10-01

FLASH and the European XFEL are SASE-FEL user facilities, at which superconducting TESLA cavities are operated in a pulsed mode to accelerate long bunch-trains. Several cavities are powered by one klystron. While the low-level rf system is able to stabilize the vector sum of the accelerating gradient of one rf station sufficiently, the rf parameters of individual cavities vary within the bunch-train. In correlation with misalignments, intrabunch-train trajectory variations are induced. An efficient model is developed to describe the effect at low beam energy, using numerically adjusted transfer matrices and discrete coupler kick coefficients, respectively. Comparison with start-to-end tracking and dedicated experiments at the FLASH injector will be shown. The short computation time of the derived model allows for comprehensive numerical studies on the impact of misalignments and variable rf parameters on the transverse intra-bunch-train beam stability at the injector module. Results from both, statistical multibunch performance studies and the deduction of misalignments from multibunch experiments are presented.

Characterisation of the high dynamic range Large Pixel Detector (LPD) and its use at X-ray free electron laser sources

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Veale, M. C.; Adkin, P.; Booker, P.

The STFC Rutherford Appleton Laboratory have delivered the Large Pixel Detector (LPD) for MHz frame rate imaging at the European XFEL. The detector system has an active area of 0.5 m × 0.5 m and consists of a million pixels on a 500 μm pitch. Sensors have been produced from 500 μm thick Hammamatsu silicon tiles that have been bump bonded to the readout ASIC using a silver epoxy and gold stud technique. Each pixel of the detector system is capable of measuring 10 5 12 keV photons per image readout at 4.5 MHz. In this paper results from themore » testing of these detectors at the Diamond Light Source and the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) are presented. As a result, the performance of the detector in terms of linearity, spatial uniformity and the performance of the different ASIC gain stages is characterised.« less

Bringing PW-class lasers to XFELs (Conference Presentation)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tomizawa, Hiromitsu

2017-06-01

Experimental researches using high power optical lasers combined with free electron lasers (FELs) open new frontiers in high energy density (HED) sciences. Probing and pumping capabilities are dramatically improved due to the brightness of the XFEL pulses with ultrafast duration. Besides, the peak intensities of Ti:sapphire laser Chirped Pulse Amplification (CPA) systems reach petawatt (PW)-class with operating in few tens of fs and commercially available at a few Hz of repetition rate. We have been developing an experimental platform for HED sciences using high power, high intensity optical lasers at the XFEL facility, SACLA.Currently, an experimental platform with a dual 0.5 PW Ti:Sapphire laser system is under beam commissioning for experiments combined with the SACLA's x-ray beam for research objectives that require more peak power in the optical laser pulses with a few tens of fs. The optical laser system is designed to deliver two laser beams simultaneously with the maximum power of 0.5 PW in each into a target chamber located in an experimental hutch 6 (EH6) at BL2, which was recently commissioned as a SACLA's 2nd hard x-ray beamline. A focusing capability using sets of compound refractive lenses will be applied to increase the x-ray fluence on the target sample. One of the most key issues for the integrated experimental platform is development of diagnostics that meets requirements both from the high power laser (e.g. resistance to harsh environments) and from the XFEL (e.g. adaptation to the available data acquisition system). The status and future perspective of the development including automatic laser alignment systems will be reported in the presentation. We will discuss the most promising and important new physics experiments that will be enabled by the combination of PW-class lasers and the world-class FEL's x-ray beam.

Compton spectra of atoms at high x-ray intensity

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Son, Sang-Kil; Geffert, Otfried; Santra, Robin

2017-03-01

Compton scattering is the nonresonant inelastic scattering of an x-ray photon by an electron and has been used to probe the electron momentum distribution in gas-phase and condensed-matter samples. In the low x-ray intensity regime, Compton scattering from atoms dominantly comes from bound electrons in neutral atoms, neglecting contributions from bound electrons in ions and free (ionized) electrons. In contrast, in the high x-ray intensity regime, the sample experiences severe ionization via x-ray multiphoton multiple ionization dynamics. Thus, it becomes necessary to take into account all the contributions to the Compton scattering signal when atoms are exposed to high-intensity x-ray pulses provided by x-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs). In this paper, we investigate the Compton spectra of atoms at high x-ray intensity, using an extension of the integrated x-ray atomic physics toolkit, xatom. As the x-ray fluence increases, there is a significant contribution from ionized electrons to the Compton spectra, which gives rise to strong deviations from the Compton spectra of neutral atoms. The present study provides not only understanding of the fundamental XFEL-matter interaction but also crucial information for single-particle imaging experiments, where Compton scattering is no longer negligible. , which features invited work from the best early-career researchers working within the scope of J. Phys. B. This project is part of the Journal of Physics series’ 50th anniversary celebrations in 2017. Sang-Kil Son was selected by the Editorial Board of J. Phys. B as an Emerging Leader.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Mukharamova, Nastasia; Lazarev, Sergey; Meijer, Janne -Mieke

We present results of the studies of dynamics in colloidal crystals performed by pump-probe experiments using an X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL). Colloidal crystals were pumped with an infrared laser at a wavelength of 800 nm with varying power and probed by XFEL pulses at an energy of 8 keV with a time delay up to 1000 ps. The positions of the Bragg peaks, and their radial and azimuthal widths were analyzed as a function of the time delay. The spectral analysis of the data did not reveal significant enhancement of frequencies expected in this experiment. As a result, this allowedmore » us to conclude that the amplitude of vibrational modes excited in colloidal crystals was less than the systematic error caused by the noise level.« less

Cavity Processing and Preparation of 650 MHz Elliptical Cell Cavities for PIP-II

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Rowe, Allan; Chandrasekaran, Saravan Kumar; Grassellino, Anna

The PIP-II project at Fermilab requires fifteen 650 MHz SRF cryomodules as part of the 800 MeV LINAC that will provide a high intensity proton beam to the Fermilab neutrino program. A total of fifty-seven high-performance SRF cavities will populate the cryomodules and will operate in both pulsed and continuous wave modes. These cavities will be processed and prepared for performance testing utilizing adapted cavity processing infrastructure already in place at Fermilab and Argonne. The processing recipes implemented for these structures will incorporate state-of-the art processing and cleaning techniques developed for 1.3 GHz SRF cavities for the ILC, XFEL, andmore » LCLS-II projects. This paper describes the details of the processing recipes and associated chemistry, heat treatment, and cleanroom processes at the Fermilab and Argonne cavity processing facilities. This paper also presents single and multi-cell cavity test results with quality factors above 5·10¹⁰ and accelerating gradients above 30 MV/m.« less

Performance in the vertical test of the 832 nine-cell 1.3 GHz cavities for the European X-ray Free Electron Laser

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Reschke, D.; Gubarev, V.; Schaffran, J.; Steder, L.; Walker, N.; Wenskat, M.; Monaco, L.

2017-04-01

The successful production and associated vertical testing of over 800 superconducting 1.3 GHz accelerating cavities for the European X-ray Free Electron Laser (XFEL) represents the culmination of over 20 years of superconducting radio-frequency R&D. The cavity production took place at two industrial vendors under the shared responsibility of INFN Milano-LASA and DESY. Average vertical testing rates at DESY exceeded 10 cavities per week, peaking at up to 15 cavities per week. The cavities sent for cryomodule assembly at Commissariat à l'énergie atomique (CEA) Saclay achieved an average maximum gradient of approximately 33 MV /m , reducing to ˜30 MV /m when the operational specifications on quality factor (Q) and field emission were included (the so-called usable gradient). Only 16% of the cavities required an additional surface retreatment to recover their low performance (usable gradient less than 20 MV /m ). These cavities were predominantly limited by excessive field emission for which a simple high pressure water rinse (HPR) was sufficient. Approximately 16% of the cavities also received an additional HPR, e.g. due to vacuum problems before or during the tests or other reasons, but these were not directly related to gradient performance. The in-depth statistical analyses presented in this report have revealed several features of the series produced cavities.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Peterson, T. J.; Weisend, II, J. G.

The TESLA collaboration developed a unique variant of SRF cryomodule designs, the chief feature being use of the large, low pressure helium vapor return pipe as the structural support backbone of the cryomodule. Additional innovative features include all cryogenic piping within the cryomodule (no parallel external cryogenic transfer line), long strings of RF cavities within a single cryomodule, and cryomodules connected in series. Several projects, including FLASH and XFEL at DESY, LCLS-II at SLAC, and the ILC technical design have adopted this general design concept. Advantages include saving space by eliminating the external transfer line, relatively tight packing of RFmore » cavities along the beamline due to fewer warm-cold transitions, and potentially lower costs. However, a primary disadvantage is the relative lack of independence for warm-up, replacement, and cool-down of individual cryomodules.« less

Low- Z polymer sample supports for fixed-target serial femtosecond X-ray crystallography

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Feld, Geoffrey K.; Heymann, Michael; Benner, W. Henry

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) offer a new avenue to the structural probing of complex materials, including biomolecules. Delivery of precious sample to the XFEL beam is a key consideration, as the sample of interest must be serially replaced after each destructive pulse. The fixed-target approach to sample delivery involves depositing samples on a thin-film support and subsequent serial introduction via a translating stage. Some classes of biological materials, including two-dimensional protein crystals, must be introduced on fixed-target supports, as they require a flat surface to prevent sample wrinkling. A series of wafer and transmission electron microscopy (TEM)-style grid supports constructedmore » of low- Z plastic have been custom-designed and produced. Aluminium TEM grid holders were engineered, capable of delivering up to 20 different conventional or plastic TEM grids using fixed-target stages available at the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS). As proof-of-principle, X-ray diffraction has been demonstrated from two-dimensional crystals of bacteriorhodopsin and three-dimensional crystals of anthrax toxin protective antigen mounted on these supports at the LCLS. In conclusion, the benefits and limitations of these low- Z fixed-target supports are discussed; it is the authors' belief that they represent a viable and efficient alternative to previously reported fixed-target supports for conducting diffraction studies with XFELs.« less

Exploring vacuum birefringence based on a 100 PW laser and an x-ray free electron laser beam

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Shen, Baifei; Bu, Zhigang; Xu, Jiancai; Xu, Tongjun; Ji, Liangliang; Li, Ruxin; Xu, Zhizhan

2018-04-01

Exploring vacuum birefringence with the station of extreme light at Shanghai Coherent Light Facility is considered. Laser pulses of intensity beyond 1023 W cm-2 are capable of polarizing the vacuum due to the ultra-strong electro-magnetic fields. The subtle difference of the vacuum refractive indexes along electric and magnetic fields leads to a birefringence effect for lights propagating through. The vacuum birefringence effect can now be captured by colliding a hard x-ray free electron laser (XFEL) beam with a high-power laser. The initial XFEL beam of pure linear polarization is predicated to gain a very small ellipticity after passing through the laser stimulated vacuum. Various interaction geometries are considered, showing that the estimated ellipticity lies between 1.8 × 10-10 and 10-9 for a 100 PW laser interacting with a 12.9 keV XFEL beam, approaching the threshold for todays’ polarity detection technique. The detailed experimental set-up is designed, including the polarimeter, the focusing compound refractive lens and the optical path. When taking into account the efficiencies of the x-ray instruments, it is found that about 10 polarization-flipped x-ray photons can be detected for a single shot for our design. Considering the background noise level, accumulating runs are necessary to obtain high confident measurement.

Kinetic modeling of x-ray laser-driven solid Al plasmas via particle-in-cell simulation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Royle, R.; Sentoku, Y.; Mancini, R. C.; Paraschiv, I.; Johzaki, T.

2017-06-01

Solid-density plasmas driven by intense x-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) radiation are seeded by sources of nonthermal photoelectrons and Auger electrons that ionize and heat the target via collisions. Simulation codes that are commonly used to model such plasmas, such as collisional-radiative (CR) codes, typically assume a Maxwellian distribution and thus instantaneous thermalization of the source electrons. In this study, we present a detailed description and initial applications of a collisional particle-in-cell code, picls, that has been extended with a self-consistent radiation transport model and Monte Carlo models for photoionization and K L L Auger ionization, enabling the fully kinetic simulation of XFEL-driven plasmas. The code is used to simulate two experiments previously performed at the Linac Coherent Light Source investigating XFEL-driven solid-density Al plasmas. It is shown that picls-simulated pulse transmissions using the Ecker-Kröll continuum-lowering model agree much better with measurements than do simulations using the Stewart-Pyatt model. Good quantitative agreement is also found between the time-dependent picls results and those of analogous simulations by the CR code scfly, which was used in the analysis of the experiments to accurately reproduce the observed K α emissions and pulse transmissions. Finally, it is shown that the effects of the nonthermal electrons are negligible for the conditions of the particular experiments under investigation.

Tutorial on X-Ray Free-Electron Lasers

DOE PAGES

Carlsten, Bruce E.

2018-05-02

This article provides a tutorial on X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) which are currently being designed, built, commissioned, and operated as fourth-generation light sources to enable discovery science in materials science, biology, and chemistry. XFELs are complex devices, driven by high-energy, high-brightness electron accelerators and cost on the order of $B. Here, we provide a basic introduction to their operating physics and a description of their main accelerator components. To make their basic operating principle accessible to the electrical engineering community, we rederive the FEL dispersion relation in a manner similar to that done for traveling-wave tubes. We finish with sectionsmore » describing some unique features of the X-rays generated and on the physics that lead to the main design limitations, including approaches for mitigation.« less

X-ray imaging detectors for synchrotron and XFEL sources

PubMed Central

Hatsui, Takaki; Graafsma, Heinz

2015-01-01

Current trends for X-ray imaging detectors based on hybrid and monolithic detector technologies are reviewed. Hybrid detectors with photon-counting pixels have proven to be very powerful tools at synchrotrons. Recent developments continue to improve their performance, especially for higher spatial resolution at higher count rates with higher frame rates. Recent developments for X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) experiments provide high-frame-rate integrating detectors with both high sensitivity and high peak signal. Similar performance improvements are sought in monolithic detectors. The monolithic approach also offers a lower noise floor, which is required for the detection of soft X-ray photons. The link between technology development and detector performance is described briefly in the context of potential future capabilities for X-ray imaging detectors. PMID:25995846

Tutorial on X-Ray Free-Electron Lasers

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Carlsten, Bruce E.

This article provides a tutorial on X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) which are currently being designed, built, commissioned, and operated as fourth-generation light sources to enable discovery science in materials science, biology, and chemistry. XFELs are complex devices, driven by high-energy, high-brightness electron accelerators and cost on the order of $B. Here, we provide a basic introduction to their operating physics and a description of their main accelerator components. To make their basic operating principle accessible to the electrical engineering community, we rederive the FEL dispersion relation in a manner similar to that done for traveling-wave tubes. We finish with sectionsmore » describing some unique features of the X-rays generated and on the physics that lead to the main design limitations, including approaches for mitigation.« less

Beam debunching due to ISR-induced energy diffusion

DOE PAGES

Yampolsky, Nikolai A.; Carlsten, Bruce E.

2017-06-20

One of the options for increasing longitudinal coherency of X-ray free electron lasers (XFELs) is seeding with a microbunched electron beam. Several schemes leading to significant amplitude of the beam bunching at X-ray wavelengths were recently proposed. All these schemes rely on beam optics having several magnetic dipoles. While the beam passes through a dipole, its energy spread increases due to quantum effects of synchrotron radiation. As a result, the bunching factor at small wavelengths reduces since electrons having different energies follow different trajectories in the bend. We rigorously calculate the reduction in the bunching factor due to incoherent synchrotronmore » the radiation while the beam travels in an arbitrary beamline. Lastly, we apply general results to estimate reduction of harmonic current in common schemes proposed for XFEL seeding.« less

Towards single particle imaging of human chromosomes at SACLA

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Robinson, Ian; Schwenke, Joerg; Yusuf, Mohammed; Estandarte, Ana; Zhang, Fucai; Chen, Bo; Clark, Jesse; Song, Changyong; Nam, Daewoong; Joti, Yasumasa; Tono, Kensuke; Yabashi, Makina; Ratnasari, Gina; Kaneyoshi, Kohei; Takata, Hideaki; Fukui, Kiichi

2015-12-01

Single particle imaging (SPI) is one of the front-page opportunities which were used to motivate the construction of the first x-ray free electron lasers (XFELs). SPI’s big advantage is that it avoids radiation damage to biological samples because the diffraction takes place in femtosecond single shots before any atomic motion can take place in the sample, hence before the onset of radiation damage. This is the ‘diffract before destruction’ theme, destruction being assured from the high x-ray doses used. This article reports our collaboration’s first attempt at SPI using the SACLA XFEL facility in June 2015. The report is limited to experience with the instrumentation and examples of data because we have not yet had time to invert them to images.

Development of a single-shot CCD-based data acquisition system for time-resolved X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy at an X-ray free-electron laser facility

PubMed Central

Oura, Masaki; Wagai, Tatsuya; Chainani, Ashish; Miyawaki, Jun; Sato, Hiromi; Matsunami, Masaharu; Eguchi, Ritsuko; Kiss, Takayuki; Yamaguchi, Takashi; Nakatani, Yasuhiro; Togashi, Tadashi; Katayama, Tetsuo; Ogawa, Kanade; Yabashi, Makina; Tanaka, Yoshihito; Kohmura, Yoshiki; Tamasaku, Kenji; Shin, Shik; Ishikawa, Tetsuya

2014-01-01

In order to utilize high-brilliance photon sources, such as X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs), for advanced time-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy (TR-PES), a single-shot CCD-based data acquisition system combined with a high-resolution hemispherical electron energy analyzer has been developed. The system’s design enables it to be controlled by an external trigger signal for single-shot pump–probe-type TR-PES. The basic performance of the system is demonstrated with an offline test, followed by online core-level photoelectron and Auger electron spectroscopy in ‘single-shot image’, ‘shot-to-shot image (image-to-image storage or block storage)’ and ‘shot-to-shot sweep’ modes at soft X-ray undulator beamline BL17SU of SPring-8. In the offline test the typical repetition rate for image-to-image storage mode has been confirmed to be about 15 Hz using a conventional pulse-generator. The function for correcting the shot-to-shot intensity fluctuations of the exciting photon beam, an important requirement for the TR-PES experiments at FEL sources, has been successfully tested at BL17SU by measuring Au 4f photoelectrons with intentionally controlled photon flux. The system has also been applied to hard X-ray PES (HAXPES) in ‘ordinary sweep’ mode as well as shot-to-shot image mode at the 27 m-long undulator beamline BL19LXU of SPring-8 and also at the SACLA XFEL facility. The XFEL-induced Ti 1s core-level spectrum of La-doped SrTiO3 is reported as a function of incident power density. The Ti 1s core-level spectrum obtained at low power density is consistent with the spectrum obtained using the synchrotron source. At high power densities the Ti 1s core-level spectra show space-charge effects which are analysed using a known mean-field model for ultrafast electron packet propagation. The results successfully confirm the capability of the present data acquisition system for carrying out the core-level HAXPES studies of condensed matter induced by the XFEL. PMID:24365935

Trans-Nationalization of Educational Policy Making: From European Innovation Projects in Adult Education to an Emerging European Space for Lifelong Learning: What Model for the European Vocational Education and Training Policy?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Bonnafous, Laurence

2014-01-01

This article is drawn from broader qualitative research on innovation in the field of professional adult training within the framework of European pilot projects such as the LEONARDO projects. This research aims at contributing to a general understanding of the phenomenon of innovation, in the context of European calls for projects, as an…

Serial Femtosecond Crystallography of G Protein-Coupled Receptors

PubMed Central

Liu, Wei; Wacker, Daniel; Gati, Cornelius; Han, Gye Won; James, Daniel; Wang, Dingjie; Nelson, Garrett; Weierstall, Uwe; Katritch, Vsevolod; Barty, Anton; Zatsepin, Nadia A.; Li, Dianfan; Messerschmidt, Marc; Boutet, Sébastien; Williams, Garth J.; Koglin, Jason E.; Seibert, M. Marvin; Wang, Chong; Shah, Syed T.A.; Basu, Shibom; Fromme, Raimund; Kupitz, Christopher; Rendek, Kimberley N.; Grotjohann, Ingo; Fromme, Petra; Kirian, Richard A.; Beyerlein, Kenneth R.; White, Thomas A.; Chapman, Henry N.; Caffrey, Martin; Spence, John C.H.; Stevens, Raymond C.; Cherezov, Vadim

2014-01-01

X-ray crystallography of G protein-coupled receptors and other membrane proteins is hampered by difficulties associated with growing sufficiently large crystals that withstand radiation damage and yield high-resolution data at synchrotron sources. Here we used an x-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) with individual 50-fs duration x-ray pulses to minimize radiation damage and obtained a high-resolution room temperature structure of a human serotonin receptor using sub-10 µm microcrystals grown in a membrane mimetic matrix known as lipidic cubic phase. Compared to the structure solved by traditional microcrystallography from cryo-cooled crystals of about two orders of magnitude larger volume, the room temperature XFEL structure displays a distinct distribution of thermal motions and conformations of residues that likely more accurately represent the receptor structure and dynamics in a cellular environment. PMID:24357322

Probing dynamics in colloidal crystals with pump-probe experiments at LCLS: Methodology and analysis

DOE PAGES

Mukharamova, Nastasia; Lazarev, Sergey; Meijer, Janne -Mieke; ...

2017-05-19

We present results of the studies of dynamics in colloidal crystals performed by pump-probe experiments using an X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL). Colloidal crystals were pumped with an infrared laser at a wavelength of 800 nm with varying power and probed by XFEL pulses at an energy of 8 keV with a time delay up to 1000 ps. The positions of the Bragg peaks, and their radial and azimuthal widths were analyzed as a function of the time delay. The spectral analysis of the data did not reveal significant enhancement of frequencies expected in this experiment. As a result, this allowedmore » us to conclude that the amplitude of vibrational modes excited in colloidal crystals was less than the systematic error caused by the noise level.« less

Femtosecond X-ray Diffraction From Two-Dimensional Protein Crystals

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Frank, Matthias; Carlson, David B.; Hunter, Mark

2014-02-28

Here we present femtosecond x-ray diffraction patterns from two-dimensional (2-D) protein crystals using an x-ray free electron laser (XFEL). To date it has not been possible to acquire x-ray diffraction from individual 2-D protein crystals due to radiation damage. However, the intense and ultrafast pulses generated by an XFEL permits a new method of collecting diffraction data before the sample is destroyed. Utilizing a diffract-before-destroy methodology at the Linac Coherent Light Source, we observed Bragg diffraction to better than 8.5 Å resolution for two different 2-D protein crystal samples that were maintained at room temperature. These proof-of-principle results show promisemore » for structural analysis of both soluble and membrane proteins arranged as 2-D crystals without requiring cryogenic conditions or the formation of three-dimensional crystals.« less

Towards phasing using high X-ray intensity

DOE PAGES

Galli, Lorenzo; Son, Sang -Kil; Barends, Thomas R. M.; ...

2015-09-30

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) show great promise for macromolecular structure determination from sub-micrometre-sized crystals, using the emerging method of serial femtosecond crystallography. The extreme brightness of the XFEL radiation can multiply ionize most, if not all, atoms in a protein, causing their scattering factors to change during the pulse, with a preferential `bleaching' of heavy atoms. This paper investigates the effects of electronic damage on experimental data collected from a Gd derivative of lysozyme microcrystals at different X-ray intensities, and the degree of ionization of Gd atoms is quantified from phased difference Fourier maps. In conclusion, a pattern sorting schememore » is proposed to maximize the ionization contrast and the way in which the local electronic damage can be used for a new experimental phasing method is discussed.« less

Serial femtosecond crystallography of soluble proteins in lipidic cubic phase

DOE PAGES

Fromme, Raimund; Ishchenko, Andrii; Metz, Markus; ...

2015-08-04

Serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) at X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) enables high-resolution protein structure determination using micrometre-sized crystals at room temperature with minimal effects from radiation damage. SFX requires a steady supply of microcrystals intersecting the XFEL beam at random orientations. An LCP–SFX method has recently been introduced in which microcrystals of membrane proteins are grown and delivered for SFX data collection inside a gel-like membrane-mimetic matrix, known as lipidic cubic phase (LCP), using a special LCP microextrusion injector. Here, it is shown enabling a dramatic reduction in the amount of crystallized protein required for data collection compared with crystals deliveredmore » by liquid injectors. High-quality LCP–SFX data sets were collected for two soluble proteins, lysozyme and phycocyanin, using less than 0.1 mg of each protein.« less

Serial femtosecond crystallography of soluble proteins in lipidic cubic phase

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Fromme, Raimund; Ishchenko, Andrii; Metz, Markus

Serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) at X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) enables high-resolution protein structure determination using micrometre-sized crystals at room temperature with minimal effects from radiation damage. SFX requires a steady supply of microcrystals intersecting the XFEL beam at random orientations. An LCP–SFX method has recently been introduced in which microcrystals of membrane proteins are grown and delivered for SFX data collection inside a gel-like membrane-mimetic matrix, known as lipidic cubic phase (LCP), using a special LCP microextrusion injector. Here, it is shown enabling a dramatic reduction in the amount of crystallized protein required for data collection compared with crystals deliveredmore » by liquid injectors. High-quality LCP–SFX data sets were collected for two soluble proteins, lysozyme and phycocyanin, using less than 0.1 mg of each protein.« less

Protein structure determination by single-wavelength anomalous diffraction phasing of X-ray free-electron laser data

DOE PAGES

Nass, Karol; Meinhart, Anton; Barends, Thomas R. M.; ...

2016-03-09

Serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) at X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) offers unprecedented possibilities for macromolecular structure determination of systems that are prone to radiation damage. However, phasing XFEL data de novo is complicated by the inherent inaccuracy of SFX data, and only a few successful examples, mostly based on exceedingly strong anomalous or isomorphous difference signals, have been reported. Here, it is shown that SFX data from thaumatin microcrystals can be successfully phased using only the weak anomalous scattering from the endogenous S atoms. Furthermore, a step-by-step investigation is presented of the particular problems of SAD phasing of SFX data, analysingmore » data from a derivative with a strong anomalous signal as well as the weak signal from endogenous S atoms.« less

Correlations in Scattered X-Ray Laser Pulses Reveal Nanoscale Structural Features of Viruses

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kurta, Ruslan P.; Donatelli, Jeffrey J.; Yoon, Chun Hong; Berntsen, Peter; Bielecki, Johan; Daurer, Benedikt J.; DeMirci, Hasan; Fromme, Petra; Hantke, Max Felix; Maia, Filipe R. N. C.; Munke, Anna; Nettelblad, Carl; Pande, Kanupriya; Reddy, Hemanth K. N.; Sellberg, Jonas A.; Sierra, Raymond G.; Svenda, Martin; van der Schot, Gijs; Vartanyants, Ivan A.; Williams, Garth J.; Xavier, P. Lourdu; Aquila, Andrew; Zwart, Peter H.; Mancuso, Adrian P.

2017-10-01

We use extremely bright and ultrashort pulses from an x-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) to measure correlations in x rays scattered from individual bioparticles. This allows us to go beyond the traditional crystallography and single-particle imaging approaches for structure investigations. We employ angular correlations to recover the three-dimensional (3D) structure of nanoscale viruses from x-ray diffraction data measured at the Linac Coherent Light Source. Correlations provide us with a comprehensive structural fingerprint of a 3D virus, which we use both for model-based and ab initio structure recovery. The analyses reveal a clear indication that the structure of the viruses deviates from the expected perfect icosahedral symmetry. Our results anticipate exciting opportunities for XFEL studies of the structure and dynamics of nanoscale objects by means of angular correlations.

Time zero determination for FEL pump-probe studies based on ultrafast melting of bismuth.

PubMed

Epp, S W; Hada, M; Zhong, Y; Kumagai, Y; Motomura, K; Mizote, S; Ono, T; Owada, S; Axford, D; Bakhtiarzadeh, S; Fukuzawa, H; Hayashi, Y; Katayama, T; Marx, A; Müller-Werkmeister, H M; Owen, R L; Sherrell, D A; Tono, K; Ueda, K; Westermeier, F; Miller, R J D

2017-09-01

A common challenge for pump-probe studies of structural dynamics at X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) is the determination of time zero (T 0 )-the time an optical pulse (e.g., an optical laser) arrives coincidently with the probe pulse (e.g., a XFEL pulse) at the sample position. In some cases, T 0 might be extracted from the structural dynamics of the sample's observed response itself, but generally, an independent robust method is required or would be superior to the inferred determination of T 0 . In this paper, we present how the structural dynamics in ultrafast melting of bismuth can be exploited for a quickly performed, reliable and accurate determination of T 0 with a precision below 20 fs and an overall experimental accuracy of 50 fs to 150 fs (estimated). Our approach is potentially useful and applicable for fixed-target XFEL experiments, such as serial femtosecond crystallography, utilizing an optical pump pulse in the ultraviolet to near infrared spectral range and a pixelated 2D photon detector for recording crystallographic diffraction patterns in transmission geometry. In comparison to many other suitable approaches, our method is fairly independent of the pumping wavelength (UV-IR) as well as of the X-ray energy and offers a favorable signal contrast. The technique is exploitable not only for the determination of temporal characteristics of the experiment at the interaction point but also for investigating important conditions affecting experimental control such as spatial overlap and beam spot sizes.

Capture and X-ray diffraction studies of protein microcrystals in a microfluidic trap array

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Lyubimov, Artem Y.; Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305; Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305

A microfluidic platform has been developed for the capture and X-ray analysis of protein microcrystals, affording a means to improve the efficiency of XFEL and synchrotron experiments. X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) promise to enable the collection of interpretable diffraction data from samples that are refractory to data collection at synchrotron sources. At present, however, more efficient sample-delivery methods that minimize the consumption of microcrystalline material are needed to allow the application of XFEL sources to a wide range of challenging structural targets of biological importance. Here, a microfluidic chip is presented in which microcrystals can be captured at fixed, addressablemore » points in a trap array from a small volume (<10 µl) of a pre-existing slurry grown off-chip. The device can be mounted on a standard goniostat for conducting diffraction experiments at room temperature without the need for flash-cooling. Proof-of-principle tests with a model system (hen egg-white lysozyme) demonstrated the high efficiency of the microfluidic approach for crystal harvesting, permitting the collection of sufficient data from only 265 single-crystal still images to permit determination and refinement of the structure of the protein. This work shows that microfluidic capture devices can be readily used to facilitate data collection from protein microcrystals grown in traditional laboratory formats, enabling analysis when cryopreservation is problematic or when only small numbers of crystals are available. Such microfluidic capture devices may also be useful for data collection at synchrotron sources.« less

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Kalaydzhyan, Tigran

Within the general theory of relativity, the curvature of spacetime is related to the energy and momentum of the present matter and radiation. One of the more specific predictions of general relativity is the deflection of light and particle trajectories in the gravitational field of massive objects. Bending angles for electromagnetic waves and light in particular were measured with a high precision. However, the effect of gravity on relativistic massive particles was never studied experimentally. Here we propose and analyze experiments devoted to that purpose. We demonstrate a high sensitivity of the laser Compton scattering at high energy accelerators tomore » the effects of gravity. The main observable – maximal energy of the scattered photons – would experience a significant shift in the ambient gravitational field even for otherwise negligible violation of the equivalence principle. In conclusion, we confirm predictions of general relativity for ultrarelativistic electrons of energy of tens of GeV at a current level of resolution and expect our work to be a starting point of further high-precision studies on current and future accelerators, such as PETRA, European XFEL and ILC.« less

Testing general relativity on accelerators

DOE PAGES

Kalaydzhyan, Tigran

2015-09-07

Within the general theory of relativity, the curvature of spacetime is related to the energy and momentum of the present matter and radiation. One of the more specific predictions of general relativity is the deflection of light and particle trajectories in the gravitational field of massive objects. Bending angles for electromagnetic waves and light in particular were measured with a high precision. However, the effect of gravity on relativistic massive particles was never studied experimentally. Here we propose and analyze experiments devoted to that purpose. We demonstrate a high sensitivity of the laser Compton scattering at high energy accelerators tomore » the effects of gravity. The main observable – maximal energy of the scattered photons – would experience a significant shift in the ambient gravitational field even for otherwise negligible violation of the equivalence principle. In conclusion, we confirm predictions of general relativity for ultrarelativistic electrons of energy of tens of GeV at a current level of resolution and expect our work to be a starting point of further high-precision studies on current and future accelerators, such as PETRA, European XFEL and ILC.« less

Open data set of live cyanobacterial cells imaged using an X-ray laser

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

van der Schot, Gijs; Svenda, Martin; Maia, Filipe R. N. C.; Hantke, Max F.; Deponte, Daniel P.; Seibert, M. Marvin; Aquila, Andrew; Schulz, Joachim; Kirian, Richard A.; Liang, Mengning; Stellato, Francesco; Bari, Sadia; Iwan, Bianca; Andreasson, Jakob; Timneanu, Nicusor; Bielecki, Johan; Westphal, Daniel; Nunes de Almeida, Francisca; Odić, Duško; Hasse, Dirk; Carlsson, Gunilla H.; Larsson, Daniel S. D.; Barty, Anton; Martin, Andrew V.; Schorb, Sebastian; Bostedt, Christoph; Bozek, John D.; Carron, Sebastian; Ferguson, Ken; Rolles, Daniel; Rudenko, Artem; Epp, Sascha W.; Foucar, Lutz; Rudek, Benedikt; Erk, Benjamin; Hartmann, Robert; Kimmel, Nils; Holl, Peter; Englert, Lars; Loh, N. Duane; Chapman, Henry N.; Andersson, Inger; Hajdu, Janos; Ekeberg, Tomas

2016-08-01

Structural studies on living cells by conventional methods are limited to low resolution because radiation damage kills cells long before the necessary dose for high resolution can be delivered. X-ray free-electron lasers circumvent this problem by outrunning key damage processes with an ultra-short and extremely bright coherent X-ray pulse. Diffraction-before-destruction experiments provide high-resolution data from cells that are alive when the femtosecond X-ray pulse traverses the sample. This paper presents two data sets from micron-sized cyanobacteria obtained at the Linac Coherent Light Source, containing a total of 199,000 diffraction patterns. Utilizing this type of diffraction data will require the development of new analysis methods and algorithms for studying structure and structural variability in large populations of cells and to create abstract models. Such studies will allow us to understand living cells and populations of cells in new ways. New X-ray lasers, like the European XFEL, will produce billions of pulses per day, and could open new areas in structural sciences.

Pulse-resolved intensity measurements at a hard X-ray FEL using semi-transparent diamond detectors

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Roth, Thomas; Freund, Wolfgang; Boesenberg, Ulrike

Solid-state ionization chambers are presented based on thin diamond crystals that allow pulse-resolved intensity measurements at a hard X-ray free-electron laser (FEL), up to the 4.5 MHz repetition rate that will become available at the European XFEL. Due to the small X-ray absorption of diamond the thin detectors are semi-transparent which eases their use as non-invasive monitoring devices in the beam. FELs are characterized by strong pulse-to-pulse intensity fluctuations due to the self-amplified spontaneous emission (SASE) process and in many experiments it is mandatory to monitor the intensity of each individual pulse. Two diamond detectors with different electrode materials, berylliummore » and graphite, were tested as intensity monitors at the XCS endstation of the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) using the pink SASE beam at 9 keV. The performance is compared with LCLS standard monitors that detect X-rays backscattered from thin SiN foils placed in the beam. In conclusion, the graphite detector can also be used as a beam position monitor although with rather coarse resolution.« less

Open data set of live cyanobacterial cells imaged using an X-ray laser.

PubMed

van der Schot, Gijs; Svenda, Martin; Maia, Filipe R N C; Hantke, Max F; DePonte, Daniel P; Seibert, M Marvin; Aquila, Andrew; Schulz, Joachim; Kirian, Richard A; Liang, Mengning; Stellato, Francesco; Bari, Sadia; Iwan, Bianca; Andreasson, Jakob; Timneanu, Nicusor; Bielecki, Johan; Westphal, Daniel; Nunes de Almeida, Francisca; Odić, Duško; Hasse, Dirk; Carlsson, Gunilla H; Larsson, Daniel S D; Barty, Anton; Martin, Andrew V; Schorb, Sebastian; Bostedt, Christoph; Bozek, John D; Carron, Sebastian; Ferguson, Ken; Rolles, Daniel; Rudenko, Artem; Epp, Sascha W; Foucar, Lutz; Rudek, Benedikt; Erk, Benjamin; Hartmann, Robert; Kimmel, Nils; Holl, Peter; Englert, Lars; Loh, N Duane; Chapman, Henry N; Andersson, Inger; Hajdu, Janos; Ekeberg, Tomas

2016-08-01

Structural studies on living cells by conventional methods are limited to low resolution because radiation damage kills cells long before the necessary dose for high resolution can be delivered. X-ray free-electron lasers circumvent this problem by outrunning key damage processes with an ultra-short and extremely bright coherent X-ray pulse. Diffraction-before-destruction experiments provide high-resolution data from cells that are alive when the femtosecond X-ray pulse traverses the sample. This paper presents two data sets from micron-sized cyanobacteria obtained at the Linac Coherent Light Source, containing a total of 199,000 diffraction patterns. Utilizing this type of diffraction data will require the development of new analysis methods and algorithms for studying structure and structural variability in large populations of cells and to create abstract models. Such studies will allow us to understand living cells and populations of cells in new ways. New X-ray lasers, like the European XFEL, will produce billions of pulses per day, and could open new areas in structural sciences.

Pulse-resolved intensity measurements at a hard X-ray FEL using semi-transparent diamond detectors

DOE PAGES

Roth, Thomas; Freund, Wolfgang; Boesenberg, Ulrike; ...

2018-01-01

Solid-state ionization chambers are presented based on thin diamond crystals that allow pulse-resolved intensity measurements at a hard X-ray free-electron laser (FEL), up to the 4.5 MHz repetition rate that will become available at the European XFEL. Due to the small X-ray absorption of diamond the thin detectors are semi-transparent which eases their use as non-invasive monitoring devices in the beam. FELs are characterized by strong pulse-to-pulse intensity fluctuations due to the self-amplified spontaneous emission (SASE) process and in many experiments it is mandatory to monitor the intensity of each individual pulse. Two diamond detectors with different electrode materials, berylliummore » and graphite, were tested as intensity monitors at the XCS endstation of the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) using the pink SASE beam at 9 keV. The performance is compared with LCLS standard monitors that detect X-rays backscattered from thin SiN foils placed in the beam. In conclusion, the graphite detector can also be used as a beam position monitor although with rather coarse resolution.« less

Open data set of live cyanobacterial cells imaged using an X-ray laser

PubMed Central

van der Schot, Gijs; Svenda, Martin; Maia, Filipe R.N.C.; Hantke, Max F.; DePonte, Daniel P.; Seibert, M. Marvin; Aquila, Andrew; Schulz, Joachim; Kirian, Richard A.; Liang, Mengning; Stellato, Francesco; Bari, Sadia; Iwan, Bianca; Andreasson, Jakob; Timneanu, Nicusor; Bielecki, Johan; Westphal, Daniel; Nunes de Almeida, Francisca; Odić, Duško; Hasse, Dirk; Carlsson, Gunilla H.; Larsson, Daniel S.D.; Barty, Anton; Martin, Andrew V.; Schorb, Sebastian; Bostedt, Christoph; Bozek, John D.; Carron, Sebastian; Ferguson, Ken; Rolles, Daniel; Rudenko, Artem; Epp, Sascha W.; Foucar, Lutz; Rudek, Benedikt; Erk, Benjamin; Hartmann, Robert; Kimmel, Nils; Holl, Peter; Englert, Lars; Loh, N. Duane; Chapman, Henry N.; Andersson, Inger; Hajdu, Janos; Ekeberg, Tomas

2016-01-01

Structural studies on living cells by conventional methods are limited to low resolution because radiation damage kills cells long before the necessary dose for high resolution can be delivered. X-ray free-electron lasers circumvent this problem by outrunning key damage processes with an ultra-short and extremely bright coherent X-ray pulse. Diffraction-before-destruction experiments provide high-resolution data from cells that are alive when the femtosecond X-ray pulse traverses the sample. This paper presents two data sets from micron-sized cyanobacteria obtained at the Linac Coherent Light Source, containing a total of 199,000 diffraction patterns. Utilizing this type of diffraction data will require the development of new analysis methods and algorithms for studying structure and structural variability in large populations of cells and to create abstract models. Such studies will allow us to understand living cells and populations of cells in new ways. New X-ray lasers, like the European XFEL, will produce billions of pulses per day, and could open new areas in structural sciences. PMID:27479514

Project Report ECLIPSE: European Citizenship Learning Program for Secondary Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Bombardelli, Olga

2014-01-01

This paper reports on a European project, the Comenius ECLIPSE project (European Citizenship Learning in a Programme for Secondary Education) developed by six European partners coordinated by the University of Trento in the years 2011-2014. ECLIPSE (co-financed by the EACEA--Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency) aims at developing,…

Preparation and characterization of B4C coatings for advanced research light sources.

PubMed

Störmer, Michael; Siewert, Frank; Sinn, Harald

2016-01-01

X-ray optical elements are required for beam transport at the current and upcoming free-electron lasers and synchrotron sources. An X-ray mirror is a combination of a substrate and a coating. The demand for large mirrors with single layers consisting of light or heavy elements has increased during the last few decades; surface finishing technology is currently able to process mirror lengths up to 1 m with microroughness at the sub-nanometre level. Additionally, thin-film fabrication is able to deposit a suitable single-layer material, such as boron carbide (B4C), some tens of nanometres thick. After deposition, the mirror should provide excellent X-ray optical properties with respect to coating thickness errors, microroughness values and slope errors; thereby enabling the mirror to transport the X-ray beam with high reflectivity, high beam flux and an undistorted wavefront to an experimental station. At the European XFEL, the technical specifications of the future mirrors are extraordinarily challenging. The acceptable shape error of the mirrors is below 2 nm along the whole length of 1 m. At the Helmholtz-Zentrum Geesthacht (HZG), amorphous layers of boron carbide with thicknesses in the range 30-60 nm were fabricated using the HZG sputtering facility, which is able to cover areas up to 1500 mm long by 120 mm wide in one step using rectangular B4C sputtering targets. The available deposition area is suitable for the specified X-ray mirror dimensions of upcoming advanced research light sources such as the European XFEL. The coatings produced were investigated by means of X-ray reflectometry and interference microscopy. The experimental results for the B4C layers are discussed according to thickness uniformity, density, microroughness and thermal stability. The variation of layer thickness in the tangential and sagittal directions was investigated in order to estimate the achieved level of uniformity over the whole deposition area, which is considerably larger than the optical area of a mirror. A waisted mask was positioned during deposition between the sputtering source and substrate to improve the thickness uniformity; particularly to prevent the formation a convex film shape in the sagittal direction. Additionally the inclination of the substrate was varied to change the layer uniformity in order to optimize the position of the mirror quality deposited area during deposition. The level of mirror microroughness was investigated for different substrates before and after deposition of a single layer of B4C. The thermal stability of the B4C layers on the various substrate materials was investigated.

Preparation and characterization of B4C coatings for advanced research light sources

PubMed Central

Störmer, Michael; Siewert, Frank; Sinn, Harald

2016-01-01

X-ray optical elements are required for beam transport at the current and upcoming free-electron lasers and synchrotron sources. An X-ray mirror is a combination of a substrate and a coating. The demand for large mirrors with single layers consisting of light or heavy elements has increased during the last few decades; surface finishing technology is currently able to process mirror lengths up to 1 m with microroughness at the sub-nanometre level. Additionally, thin-film fabrication is able to deposit a suitable single-layer material, such as boron carbide (B4C), some tens of nanometres thick. After deposition, the mirror should provide excellent X-ray optical properties with respect to coating thickness errors, microroughness values and slope errors; thereby enabling the mirror to transport the X-ray beam with high reflectivity, high beam flux and an undistorted wavefront to an experimental station. At the European XFEL, the technical specifications of the future mirrors are extraordinarily challenging. The acceptable shape error of the mirrors is below 2 nm along the whole length of 1 m. At the Helmholtz-Zentrum Geesthacht (HZG), amorphous layers of boron carbide with thicknesses in the range 30–60 nm were fabricated using the HZG sputtering facility, which is able to cover areas up to 1500 mm long by 120 mm wide in one step using rectangular B4C sputtering targets. The available deposition area is suitable for the specified X-ray mirror dimensions of upcoming advanced research light sources such as the European XFEL. The coatings produced were investigated by means of X-ray reflectometry and interference microscopy. The experimental results for the B4C layers are discussed according to thickness uniformity, density, microroughness and thermal stability. The variation of layer thickness in the tangential and sagittal directions was investigated in order to estimate the achieved level of uniformity over the whole deposition area, which is considerably larger than the optical area of a mirror. A waisted mask was positioned during deposition between the sputtering source and substrate to improve the thickness uniformity; particularly to prevent the formation a convex film shape in the sagittal direction. Additionally the inclination of the substrate was varied to change the layer uniformity in order to optimize the position of the mirror quality deposited area during deposition. The level of mirror microroughness was investigated for different substrates before and after deposition of a single layer of B4C. The thermal stability of the B4C layers on the various substrate materials was investigated. PMID:26698045

Soft X-ray FEL simulation in PAL-XFEL

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Shim, Chi Hyun; Ko, In Soo; Parc, Yong Woon; Han, Jang Hui

2015-10-01

The soft X-ray beamline in the Pohang Accelerator Laboratory X-ray Free Electron Laser (PAL-XFEL) will provide a photon beam with a wavelength from 1 nm to 3 nm in the self-amplified spontaneous emission (SASE) mode by using an electron beam with a 3.15-GeV beam energy. Linearly polarized radiation will be supplied by using six planar undulators (PUs). The linearly-polarized radiation powers at 1 (3) nm can reach 10.2 (30) GW. Polarization of the radiation will be controlled by applying the reverse undulator tapering scheme to the PUs and adding two helical undulators (HUs). The circularly-polarized radiation powers at 1 (3) nm will be 3.11 (11.73) GW. The degrees of circular polarization will be larger than 0.99 for both wavelengths. Three options for the future upgrade of the beamline to increase the radiation power are proposed.

On the release of cppxfel for processing X-ray free-electron laser images.

PubMed

Ginn, Helen Mary; Evans, Gwyndaf; Sauter, Nicholas K; Stuart, David Ian

2016-06-01

As serial femtosecond crystallography expands towards a variety of delivery methods, including chip-based methods, and smaller collected data sets, the requirement to optimize the data analysis to produce maximum structure quality is becoming increasingly pressing. Here cppxfel , a software package primarily written in C++, which showcases several data analysis techniques, is released. This software package presently indexes images using DIALS (diffraction integration for advanced light sources) and performs an initial orientation matrix refinement, followed by post-refinement of individual images against a reference data set. Cppxfel is released with the hope that the unique and useful elements of this package can be repurposed for existing software packages. However, as released, it produces high-quality crystal structures and is therefore likely to be also useful to experienced users of X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) software who wish to maximize the information extracted from a limited number of XFEL images.

On the release of cppxfel for processing X-ray free-electron laser images

DOE PAGES

Ginn, Helen Mary; Evans, Gwyndaf; Sauter, Nicholas K.; ...

2016-05-11

As serial femtosecond crystallography expands towards a variety of delivery methods, including chip-based methods, and smaller collected data sets, the requirement to optimize the data analysis to produce maximum structure quality is becoming increasingly pressing. Herecppxfel, a software package primarily written in C++, which showcases several data analysis techniques, is released. This software package presently indexes images using DIALS (diffraction integration for advanced light sources) and performs an initial orientation matrix refinement, followed by post-refinement of individual images against a reference data set.Cppxfelis released with the hope that the unique and useful elements of this package can be repurposed formore » existing software packages. However, as released, it produces high-quality crystal structures and is therefore likely to be also useful to experienced users of X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) software who wish to maximize the information extracted from a limited number of XFEL images.« less

High-resolution structure of viruses from random diffraction snapshots

PubMed Central

Hosseinizadeh, A.; Schwander, P.; Dashti, A.; Fung, R.; D'Souza, R. M.; Ourmazd, A.

2014-01-01

The advent of the X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) has made it possible to record diffraction snapshots of biological entities injected into the X-ray beam before the onset of radiation damage. Algorithmic means must then be used to determine the snapshot orientations and thence the three-dimensional structure of the object. Existing Bayesian approaches are limited in reconstruction resolution typically to 1/10 of the object diameter, with the computational expense increasing as the eighth power of the ratio of diameter to resolution. We present an approach capable of exploiting object symmetries to recover three-dimensional structure to high resolution, and thus reconstruct the structure of the satellite tobacco necrosis virus to atomic level. Our approach offers the highest reconstruction resolution for XFEL snapshots to date and provides a potentially powerful alternative route for analysis of data from crystalline and nano-crystalline objects. PMID:24914154

High-resolution structure of viruses from random diffraction snapshots.

PubMed

Hosseinizadeh, A; Schwander, P; Dashti, A; Fung, R; D'Souza, R M; Ourmazd, A

2014-07-17

The advent of the X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) has made it possible to record diffraction snapshots of biological entities injected into the X-ray beam before the onset of radiation damage. Algorithmic means must then be used to determine the snapshot orientations and thence the three-dimensional structure of the object. Existing Bayesian approaches are limited in reconstruction resolution typically to 1/10 of the object diameter, with the computational expense increasing as the eighth power of the ratio of diameter to resolution. We present an approach capable of exploiting object symmetries to recover three-dimensional structure to high resolution, and thus reconstruct the structure of the satellite tobacco necrosis virus to atomic level. Our approach offers the highest reconstruction resolution for XFEL snapshots to date and provides a potentially powerful alternative route for analysis of data from crystalline and nano-crystalline objects.

Correlations in Scattered X-Ray Laser Pulses Reveal Nanoscale Structural Features of Viruses

DOE PAGES

Kurta, Ruslan P.; Donatelli, Jeffrey J.; Yoon, Chun Hong; ...

2017-10-12

We use extremely bright and ultrashort pulses from an x-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) to measure correlations in x rays scattered from individual bioparticles. This allows us to go beyond the traditional crystallography and single-particle imaging approaches for structure investigations. We employ angular correlations to recover the three-dimensional (3D) structure of nanoscale viruses from x-ray diffraction data measured at the Linac Coherent Light Source. Correlations provide us with a comprehensive structural fingerprint of a 3D virus, which we use both for model-based and ab initio structure recovery. The analyses reveal a clear indication that the structure of the viruses deviates frommore » the expected perfect icosahedral symmetry. Lastly, our results anticipate exciting opportunities for XFEL studies of the structure and dynamics of nanoscale objects by means of angular correlations.« less

Serial femtosecond crystallography of soluble proteins in lipidic cubic phase

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Fromme, Raimund; Ishchenko, Andrii; Metz, Markus

Serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) at X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) enables high-resolution protein structure determination using micrometre-sized crystals at room temperature with minimal effects from radiation damage. SFX requires a steady supply of microcrystals intersecting the XFEL beam at random orientations. An LCP–SFX method has recently been introduced in which microcrystals of membrane proteins are grown and delivered for SFX data collection inside a gel-like membrane-mimetic matrix, known as lipidic cubic phase (LCP), using a special LCP microextrusion injector. Here, it is demonstrated that LCP can also be used as a suitable carrier medium for microcrystals of soluble proteins, enabling amore » dramatic reduction in the amount of crystallized protein required for data collection compared with crystals delivered by liquid injectors. High-quality LCP–SFX data sets were collected for two soluble proteins, lysozyme and phycocyanin, using less than 0.1 mg of each protein.« less

Fixed target matrix for femtosecond time-resolved and in situ serial micro-crystallography

PubMed Central

Mueller, C.; Marx, A.; Epp, S. W.; Zhong, Y.; Kuo, A.; Balo, A. R.; Soman, J.; Schotte, F.; Lemke, H. T.; Owen, R. L.; Pai, E. F.; Pearson, A. R.; Olson, J. S.; Anfinrud, P. A.; Ernst, O. P.; Dwayne Miller, R. J.

2015-01-01

We present a crystallography chip enabling in situ room temperature crystallography at microfocus synchrotron beamlines and X-ray free-electron laser (X-FEL) sources. Compared to other in situ approaches, we observe extremely low background and high diffraction data quality. The chip design is robust and allows fast and efficient loading of thousands of small crystals. The ability to load a large number of protein crystals, at room temperature and with high efficiency, into prescribed positions enables high throughput automated serial crystallography with microfocus synchrotron beamlines. In addition, we demonstrate the application of this chip for femtosecond time-resolved serial crystallography at the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS, Menlo Park, California, USA). The chip concept enables multiple images to be acquired from each crystal, allowing differential detection of changes in diffraction intensities in order to obtain high signal-to-noise and fully exploit the time resolution capabilities of XFELs. PMID:26798825

Time-resolved X-ray spectroscopies of chemical systems: New perspectives

PubMed Central

Chergui, Majed

2016-01-01

The past 3–5 years have witnessed a dramatic increase in the number of time-resolved X-ray spectroscopic studies, mainly driven by novel technical and methodological developments. The latter include (i) the high repetition rate optical pump/X-ray probe studies, which have greatly boosted the signal-to-noise ratio for picosecond (ps) X-ray absorption spectroscopy studies, while enabling ps X-ray emission spectroscopy (XES) at synchrotrons; (ii) the X-ray free electron lasers (XFELs) are a game changer and have allowed the first femtosecond (fs) XES and resonant inelastic X-ray scattering experiments to be carried out; (iii) XFELs are also opening the road to the development of non-linear X-ray methods. In this perspective, I will mainly focus on the most recent technical developments and briefly address some examples of scientific questions that have been addressed thanks to them. I will look at the novel opportunities in the horizon. PMID:27376102

Roadmap to MaRIE March 2015

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Barnes, Cris William

Los Alamos National Laboratory’s proposed MaRIE facility is slated to introduce the world’s highest energy hard x-ray free electron laser (XFEL). As the light source for the Matter-Radiation Interactions in Extremes experimental facility (MaRIE), the 42-keV XFEL, with bursts of x-ray pulses at gigahertz repetition for studying fast dynamical processes, will help accelerate discovery and design of the advanced materials needed to meet 21st-century national security and energy security challenges. Yet the science of free-electron lasers has a long and distinguished history at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), where for nearly four decades Los Alamos scientists have been performing research,more » design, development, and collaboration work in FEL science. The work at Los Alamos has evolved from low-gain amplifier and oscillator FEL development to highbrightness photoinjector development, and later, self-amplified spontaneous emission (SASE) and high-gain amplifier FEL development.« less

Data Exploration Toolkit for serial diffraction experiments

DOE PAGES

Zeldin, Oliver B.; Brewster, Aaron S.; Hattne, Johan; ...

2015-01-23

Ultrafast diffraction at X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) has the potential to yield new insights into important biological systems that produce radiation-sensitive crystals. An unavoidable feature of the 'diffraction before destruction' nature of these experiments is that images are obtained from many distinct crystals and/or different regions of the same crystal. Combined with other sources of XFEL shot-to-shot variation, this introduces significant heterogeneity into the diffraction data, complicating processing and interpretation. To enable researchers to get the most from their collected data, a toolkit is presented that provides insights into the quality of, and the variation present in, serial crystallography datamore » sets. These tools operate on the unmerged, partial intensity integration results from many individual crystals, and can be used on two levels: firstly to guide the experimental strategy during data collection, and secondly to help users make informed choices during data processing.« less

Brightness analysis of an electron beam with a complex profile

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Maesaka, Hirokazu; Hara, Toru; Togawa, Kazuaki; Inagaki, Takahiro; Tanaka, Hitoshi

2018-05-01

We propose a novel analysis method to obtain the core bright part of an electron beam with a complex phase-space profile. This method is beneficial to evaluate the performance of simulation data of a linear accelerator (linac), such as an x-ray free electron laser (XFEL) machine, since the phase-space distribution of a linac electron beam is not simple, compared to a Gaussian beam in a synchrotron. In this analysis, the brightness of undulator radiation is calculated and the core of an electron beam is determined by maximizing the brightness. We successfully extracted core electrons from a complex beam profile of XFEL simulation data, which was not expressed by a set of slice parameters. FEL simulations showed that the FEL intensity was well remained even after extracting the core part. Consequently, the FEL performance can be estimated by this analysis without time-consuming FEL simulations.

Fixed target matrix for femtosecond time-resolved and in situ serial micro-crystallography.

PubMed

Mueller, C; Marx, A; Epp, S W; Zhong, Y; Kuo, A; Balo, A R; Soman, J; Schotte, F; Lemke, H T; Owen, R L; Pai, E F; Pearson, A R; Olson, J S; Anfinrud, P A; Ernst, O P; Dwayne Miller, R J

2015-09-01

We present a crystallography chip enabling in situ room temperature crystallography at microfocus synchrotron beamlines and X-ray free-electron laser (X-FEL) sources. Compared to other in situ approaches, we observe extremely low background and high diffraction data quality. The chip design is robust and allows fast and efficient loading of thousands of small crystals. The ability to load a large number of protein crystals, at room temperature and with high efficiency, into prescribed positions enables high throughput automated serial crystallography with microfocus synchrotron beamlines. In addition, we demonstrate the application of this chip for femtosecond time-resolved serial crystallography at the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS, Menlo Park, California, USA). The chip concept enables multiple images to be acquired from each crystal, allowing differential detection of changes in diffraction intensities in order to obtain high signal-to-noise and fully exploit the time resolution capabilities of XFELs.

Multiple defocused coherent diffraction imaging: method for simultaneously reconstructing objects and probe using X-ray free-electron lasers.

PubMed

Hirose, Makoto; Shimomura, Kei; Suzuki, Akihiro; Burdet, Nicolas; Takahashi, Yukio

2016-05-30

The sample size must be less than the diffraction-limited focal spot size of the incident beam in single-shot coherent X-ray diffraction imaging (CXDI) based on a diffract-before-destruction scheme using X-ray free electron lasers (XFELs). This is currently a major limitation preventing its wider applications. We here propose multiple defocused CXDI, in which isolated objects are sequentially illuminated with a divergent beam larger than the objects and the coherent diffraction pattern of each object is recorded. This method can simultaneously reconstruct both objects and a probe from the coherent X-ray diffraction patterns without any a priori knowledge. We performed a computer simulation of the prposed method and then successfully demonstrated it in a proof-of-principle experiment at SPring-8. The prposed method allows us to not only observe broad samples but also characterize focused XFEL beams.

XFEL resonant photo-pumping of dense plasmas and dynamic evolution of autoionizing core hole states

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rosmej, F. B.; Moinard, A.; Renner, O.; Galtier, E.; Lee, J. J.; Nagler, B.; Heimann, P. A.; Schlotter, W.; Turner, J. J.; Lee, R. W.; Makita, M.; Riley, D.; Seely, J.

2016-03-01

Similarly to the case of LIF (Laser-Induced Fluorescence), an equally revolutionary impact to science is expected from resonant X-ray photo-pumping. It will particularly contribute to a progress in high energy density science: pumped core hole states create X-ray transitions that can escape dense matter on a 10 fs-time scale without essential photoabsorption, thus providing a unique possibility to study matter under extreme conditions. In the first proof of principle experiment at the X-ray Free Electron Laser LCLS at SCLAC [Seely, J., Rosmej, F.B., Shepherd, R., Riley, D., Lee, R.W. Proposal to Perform the 1st High Energy Density Plasma Spectroscopic Pump/Probe Experiment”, approved LCLS proposal L332 (2010)] we have successfully pumped inner-shell X-ray transitions in dense plasmas. The plasma was generated with a YAG laser irradiating solid Al and Mg targets attached to a rotating cylinder. In parallel to the optical laser beam, the XFEL was focused into the plasma plume at different delay times and pump energies. Pumped X-ray transitions have been observed with a spherically bent crystal spectrometer coupled to a Princeton CCD. By using this experimental configuration, we have simultaneously achieved extremely high spectral (λ/δλ ≈ 5000) and spatial resolution (δx≈70 μm) while maintaining high luminosity and a large spectral range covered (6.90 - 8.35 Å). By precisely measuring the variations in spectra emitted from plasma under action of XFEL radiation, we have successfully demonstrated transient X- ray pumping in a dense plasma.

Phase retrieval for crystalline specimens

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Arnal, Romain A.; Millane, Rick P.

2017-09-01

The recent availability of ultra-bright and ultra-short X-rays pulses from new sources called x-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) has introduced a new paradigm in X-ray crystallography. Called "diffraction-before-destruction," this paradigm addresses the main problems that plague crystallography using synchrotron sources. However, the phase problem of coherent diffraction imaging remains: one has to retrieve the phase of the measured diffraction amplitude in order to reconstruct the object. Fibrous and membrane proteins that crystallize in 1D and 2D crystals can now potentially be used for data collection with free-electron lasers. The crystallographic phase problem with such crystalline specimens is eased as the Fourier amplitude can be sampled more finely than at the Bragg sampling along one or two directions. Here we characterise uniqueness of the phase problem for different types of crystalline specimen. Simulated ab initio phase retrieval using iterative projection algorithms for 2D crystals is presented.

Imaging of Biological Tissues by Visible Light CDI

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Karpov, Dmitry; Dos Santos Rolo, Tomy; Rich, Hannah; Fohtung, Edwin

Recent advances in the use of synchrotron and X-ray free electron laser (XFEL) based coherent diffraction imaging (CDI) with application to material sciences and medicine proved the technique to be efficient in recovering information about the samples encoded in the phase domain. The current state-of-the-art algorithms of reconstruction are transferable to optical frequencies, which makes laser sources a reasonable milestone both in technique development and applications. Here we present first results from table-top laser CDI system for imaging of biological tissues and reconstruction algorithms development and discuss approaches that are complimenting the data quality improvement that is applicable to visible light frequencies due to it's properties. We demonstrate applicability of the developed methodology to a wide class of soft bio-matter and condensed matter systems. This project is funded by DOD-AFOSR under Award No FA9550-14-1-0363 and the LANSCE Professorship at LANL.

Preparation and Design of Educational Material in a European Multi-Partner Telematics Project.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Dobbeni, Ann; Botke, Jolanda; Marks, Ken

1998-01-01

Describes "TOPILOT," a European telematics project coordinated by the European Federation for the Education of the Children of Occupational Travellers (EFECOT), which responds to the educational and training needs of fairground, circus, and bargee families. Discusses teacher involvement, linking project phases, and communication and the…

Optimization of cathodic arc deposition and pulsed plasma melting techniques for growing smooth superconducting Pb photoemissive films for SRF injectors

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nietubyć, Robert; Lorkiewicz, Jerzy; Sekutowicz, Jacek; Smedley, John; Kosińska, Anna

2018-05-01

Superconducting photoinjectors have a potential to be the optimal solution for moderate and high current cw operating free electron lasers. For this application, a superconducting lead (Pb) cathode has been proposed to simplify the cathode integration into a 1.3 GHz, TESLA-type, 1.6-cell long purely superconducting gun cavity. In the proposed design, a lead film several micrometres thick is deposited onto a niobium plug attached to the cavity back wall. Traditional lead deposition techniques usually produce very non-uniform emission surfaces and often result in a poor adhesion of the layer. A pulsed plasma melting procedure reducing the non-uniformity of the lead photocathodes is presented. In order to determine the parameters optimal for this procedure, heat transfer from plasma to the film was first modelled to evaluate melting front penetration range and liquid state duration. The obtained results were verified by surface inspection of witness samples. The optimal procedure was used to prepare a photocathode plug, which was then tested in an electron gun. The quantum efficiency and the value of cavity quality factor have been found to satisfy the requirements for an injector of the European-XFEL facility.

Direct experimental observation of the gas density depression effect using a two-bunch X-ray FEL beam.

PubMed

Feng, Y; Schafer, D W; Song, S; Sun, Y; Zhu, D; Krzywinski, J; Robert, A; Wu, J; Decker, F J

2018-01-01

The experimental observation of the depression effect in gas devices designed for X-ray free-electron lasers (FELs) is reported. The measurements were carried out at the Linac Coherent Light Source using a two-bunch FEL beam at 6.5 keV with 122.5 ns separation passing through an argon gas cell. The relative intensities of the two pulses of the two-bunch beam were measured, after and before the gas cell, from X-ray scattering off thin targets by using fast diodes with sufficient temporal resolution. At a cell pressure of 140 hPa, it was found that the after-to-before ratio of the intensities of the second pulse was about 17% ± 6% higher than that of the first pulse, revealing lower effective attenuation of the gas cell due to heating by the first pulse and subsequent gas density reduction in the beam path. This measurement is important in guiding the design and/or mitigating the adverse effects in gas devices for high-repetition-rate FELs such as the LCLS-II and the European XFEL or other future high-repetition-rate upgrades to existing FEL facilities.

Direct experimental observation of the gas density depression effect using a two-bunch X-ray FEL beam

DOE PAGES

Feng, Y.; Schafer, D. W.; Song, S.; ...

2018-01-01

The experimental observation of the depression effect in gas devices designed for X-ray free-electron lasers (FELs) is reported. The measurements were carried out at the Linac Coherent Light Source using a two-bunch FEL beam at 6.5 keV with 122.5 ns separation passing through an argon gas cell. The relative intensities of the two pulses of the two-bunch beam were measured, after and before the gas cell, from X-ray scattering off thin targets by using fast diodes with sufficient temporal resolution. At a cell pressure of 140 hPa, it was found that the after-to-before ratio of the intensities of the secondmore » pulse was about 17% ± 6% higher than that of the first pulse, revealing lower effective attenuation of the gas cell due to heating by the first pulse and subsequent gas density reduction in the beam path. Furthermore, this measurement is important in guiding the design and/or mitigating the adverse effects in gas devices for high-repetition-rate FELs such as the LCLS-II and the European XFEL or other future high-repetition-rate upgrades to existing FEL facilities.« less

Direct experimental observation of the gas density depression effect using a two-bunch X-ray FEL beam

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Feng, Y.; Schafer, D. W.; Song, S.

The experimental observation of the depression effect in gas devices designed for X-ray free-electron lasers (FELs) is reported. The measurements were carried out at the Linac Coherent Light Source using a two-bunch FEL beam at 6.5 keV with 122.5 ns separation passing through an argon gas cell. The relative intensities of the two pulses of the two-bunch beam were measured, after and before the gas cell, from X-ray scattering off thin targets by using fast diodes with sufficient temporal resolution. At a cell pressure of 140 hPa, it was found that the after-to-before ratio of the intensities of the secondmore » pulse was about 17% ± 6% higher than that of the first pulse, revealing lower effective attenuation of the gas cell due to heating by the first pulse and subsequent gas density reduction in the beam path. Furthermore, this measurement is important in guiding the design and/or mitigating the adverse effects in gas devices for high-repetition-rate FELs such as the LCLS-II and the European XFEL or other future high-repetition-rate upgrades to existing FEL facilities.« less

Performance of a reentrant cavity beam position monitor

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Simon, Claire; Luong, Michel; Chel, Stéphane; Napoly, Olivier; Novo, Jorge; Roudier, Dominique; Rouvière, Nelly; Baboi, Nicoleta; Mildner, Nils; Nölle, Dirk

2008-08-01

The beam-based alignment and feedback systems, essential operations for the future colliders, require high resolution beam position monitors (BPMs). In the framework of the European CARE/SRF program, a reentrant cavity BPM with its associated electronics was developed by the CEA/DSM/Irfu in collaboration with DESY. The design, the fabrication, and the beam test of this monitor are detailed within this paper. This BPM is designed to be inserted in a cryomodule, work at cryogenic temperature in a clean environment. It has achieved a resolution better than 10μm and has the possibility to perform bunch to bunch measurements for the x-ray free electron laser (X-FEL) and the International Linear Collider (ILC). Its other features are a small size of the rf cavity, a large aperture (78 mm), and an excellent linearity. A first prototype of a reentrant cavity BPM was installed in the free electron laser in Hamburg (FLASH), at Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron (DESY) and demonstrated its operation at cryogenic temperature inside a cryomodule. The second, installed, also, in the FLASH linac to be tested with beam, measured a resolution of approximately 4μm over a dynamic range ±5mm in single bunch.

Research and Grant Management: The Role of the Project Management Office (PMO) in a European Research Consortium Context

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Wedekind, Gerben Kristian; Philbin, Simon Patrick

2018-01-01

This paper illustrates how a university-based project management office (PMO) can provide focused support across the entire grant project lifecycle within a European research context. In recent years, EU (European Union) research and innovation grant programs have increasingly shifted to support multidisciplinary consortia composed of industry,…

Students Opinions and Attitudes toward LGBT Persons and Rights: Results of a Transnational European Project

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Passani, Antonella; Debicki, Marie

2016-01-01

This article presents the research results of the European co-funded project NISO: Fighting Homophobia Through Active Citizenship and Media Education. The project combined research and non-formal education activities in four European countries: Belgium, Estonia, Italy and the Netherlands. The research intended to identify and analyze high school…

High-resolution single-shot spectral monitoring of hard x-ray free-electron laser radiation

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Makita, M.; Karvinen, P.; Zhu, D.

We have developed an on-line spectrometer for hard x-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) radiation based on a nanostructured diamond diffraction grating and a bent crystal analyzer. Our method provides high spectral resolution, interferes negligibly with the XFEL beam, and can withstand the intense hard x-ray pulses at high repetition rates of >100 Hz. The spectrometer is capable of providing shot-to-shot spectral information for the normalization of data obtained in scientific experiments and optimization of the accelerator operation parameters. We have demonstrated these capabilities of the setup at the Linac Coherent Light Source, in self-amplified spontaneous emission mode at full energy ofmore » >1 mJ with a 120 Hz repetition rate, obtaining a resolving power of Ε/δΕ > 3 × 10 4. In conclusion, the device was also used to monitor the effects of pulse duration down to 8 fs by analysis of the spectral spike width.« less

Electron and fluorescence spectra of a water molecule irradiated by an x-ray free-electron laser pulse

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Schäfer, Julia M.; Inhester, Ludger; Son, Sang-Kil; Fink, Reinhold F.; Santra, Robin

2018-05-01

With the highly intense x-ray light generated by x-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs), molecular samples can be ionized many times in a single pulse. Here we report on a computational study of molecular spectroscopy at the high x-ray intensity provided by XFELs. Calculated photoelectron, Auger electron, and x-ray fluorescence spectra are presented for a single water molecule that reaches many electronic hole configurations through repeated ionization steps. The rich details shown in the spectra depend on the x-ray pulse parameters in a nonintuitive way. We discuss how the observed trends can be explained by the competition of microscopic electronic transition processes. A detailed comparison between spectra calculated within the independent-atom model and within the molecular-orbital framework highlights the chemical sensitivity of the spectral lines of multiple-hole configurations. Our results demonstrate how x-ray multiphoton ionization-related effects such as charge-rearrangement-enhanced x-ray ionization of molecules and frustrated absorption manifest themselves in the electron and fluorescence spectra.

X-ray absorption spectroscopy using a self-seeded soft X-ray free-electron laser

DOE PAGES

Kroll, Thomas; Kern, Jan; Kubin, Markus; ...

2016-09-19

X-ray free electron lasers (XFELs) enable unprecedented new ways to study the electronic structure and dynamics of transition metal systems. L-edge absorption spectroscopy is a powerful technique for such studies and the feasibility of this method at XFELs for solutions and solids has been demonstrated. But, the required x-ray bandwidth is an order of magnitude narrower than that of self-amplified spontaneous emission (SASE), and additional monochromatization is needed. We compare L-edge x-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS) of a prototypical transition metal system based on monochromatizing the SASE radiation of the linac coherent light source (LCLS) with a new technique based onmore » self-seeding of LCLS. We demonstrate how L-edge XAS can be performed using the self-seeding scheme without the need of an additional beam line monochromator. Lastly, we show how the spectral shape and pulse energy depend on the undulator setup and how this affects the x-ray spectroscopy measurements.« less

Double emittance exchanger as a bunch compressor for the MaRIE XFEL electron beam line at 1 GeV

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Malyzhenkov, Alexander; Carlsten, Bruce E.; Yampolsky, Nikolai A.

2017-03-01

We demonstrate an alternative realization of a bunch compressor (specifically, the second bunch compressor for the MaRIE XFEL beamline, 1GeV electron energy) using a double emittance exchanger (EEX) and a telescope in the transverse phase space. We compare our results with a traditional bunch compressor realized via a chicane, taking into account the nonlinear dynamics, Coherent Synchrotron Radiation (CSR) and Space Charge (SC) effects. In particular, we use the Elegant code for tracking particles through the beamline, and analyze the evolution of the eigen-emittances to separate the influence of the CSR/SC effects from the nonlinear dynamics effects. We optimize the scheme parameters to reach a desirable compression factor and minimize the emittance growth. We observe dominant CSR effects in our scheme, resulting in critical emittance growth, and introduce an alternative version of an emittance exchanger with a reduced number of bending magnets to minimize the impact of CSR effects.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Nilsson, A.; LaRue, J.; Öberg, H.

Here, we describe how the unique temporal and spectral characteristics of X-ray free-electron lasers (XFEL) can be utilized to follow chemical transformations in heterogeneous catalysis in real time. We highlight the systematic study of CO oxidation on Ru(0 0 0 1), which we initiate either using a femtosecond pulse from an optical laser or by activating only the oxygen atoms using a THz pulse. We find that CO is promoted into an entropy-controlled precursor state prior to desorbing when the surface is heated in the absence of oxygen, whereas in the presence of oxygen, CO desorbs directly into the gasmore » phase. We monitor the activation of atomic oxygen explicitly by the reduced split between bonding and antibonding orbitals as the oxygen comes out of the strongly bound hollow position. Applying these novel XFEL techniques to the full oxidation reaction resulted in the surprising observation of a significant fraction of the reactants at the transition state through the electronic signature of the new bond formation.« less

Acoustic Injectors for Drop-On-Demand Serial Femtosecond Crystallography.

PubMed

Roessler, Christian G; Agarwal, Rakhi; Allaire, Marc; Alonso-Mori, Roberto; Andi, Babak; Bachega, José F R; Bommer, Martin; Brewster, Aaron S; Browne, Michael C; Chatterjee, Ruchira; Cho, Eunsun; Cohen, Aina E; Cowan, Matthew; Datwani, Sammy; Davidson, Victor L; Defever, Jim; Eaton, Brent; Ellson, Richard; Feng, Yiping; Ghislain, Lucien P; Glownia, James M; Han, Guangye; Hattne, Johan; Hellmich, Julia; Héroux, Annie; Ibrahim, Mohamed; Kern, Jan; Kuczewski, Anthony; Lemke, Henrik T; Liu, Pinghua; Majlof, Lars; McClintock, William M; Myers, Stuart; Nelsen, Silke; Olechno, Joe; Orville, Allen M; Sauter, Nicholas K; Soares, Alexei S; Soltis, S Michael; Song, Heng; Stearns, Richard G; Tran, Rosalie; Tsai, Yingssu; Uervirojnangkoorn, Monarin; Wilmot, Carrie M; Yachandra, Vittal; Yano, Junko; Yukl, Erik T; Zhu, Diling; Zouni, Athina

2016-04-05

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) provide very intense X-ray pulses suitable for macromolecular crystallography. Each X-ray pulse typically lasts for tens of femtoseconds and the interval between pulses is many orders of magnitude longer. Here we describe two novel acoustic injection systems that use focused sound waves to eject picoliter to nanoliter crystal-containing droplets out of microplates and into the X-ray pulse from which diffraction data are collected. The on-demand droplet delivery is synchronized to the XFEL pulse scheme, resulting in X-ray pulses intersecting up to 88% of the droplets. We tested several types of samples in a range of crystallization conditions, wherein the overall crystal hit ratio (e.g., fraction of images with observable diffraction patterns) is a function of the microcrystal slurry concentration. We report crystal structures from lysozyme, thermolysin, and stachydrine demethylase (Stc2). Additional samples were screened to demonstrate that these methods can be applied to rare samples. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Serial snapshot crystallography for materials science with SwissFEL

DOE PAGES

Dejoie, Catherine; Smeets, Stef; Baerlocher, Christian; ...

2015-04-21

New opportunities for studying (sub)microcrystalline materials with small unit cells, both organic and inorganic, will open up when the X-ray free electron laser (XFEL) presently being constructed in Switzerland (SwissFEL) comes online in 2017. Our synchrotron-based experiments mimicking the 4%-energy-bandpass mode of the SwissFEL beam show that it will be possible to record a diffraction pattern of up to 10 randomly oriented crystals in a single snapshot, to index the resulting reflections, and to extract their intensities reliably. The crystals are destroyed with each XFEL pulse, but by combining snapshots from several sets of crystals, a complete set of datamore » can be assembled, and crystal structures of materials that are difficult to analyze otherwise will become accessible. Even with a single shot, at least a partial analysis of the crystal structure will be possible, and with 10–50 femtosecond pulses, this offers tantalizing possibilities for time-resolved studies.« less

Drop-on-Demand Sample Delivery for Studying Biocatalysts in Action at XFELs

PubMed Central

Fuller, Franklin D.; Gul, Sheraz; Chatterjee, Ruchira; Burgie, Ernest S.; Young, Iris D.; Lebrette, Hugo; Srinivas, Vivek; Brewster, Aaron S.; Michels-Clark, Tara; Clinger, Jonathan A.; Andi, Babak; Ibrahim, Mohamed; Pastor, Ernest; de Lichtenberg, Casper; Hussein, Rana; Pollock, Christopher J.; Zhang, Miao; Stan, Claudiu A.; Kroll, Thomas; Fransson, Thomas; Weninger, Clemens; Kubin, Markus; Aller, Pierre; Lassalle, Louise; Bräuer, Philipp; Miller, Mitchell D.; Amin, Muhamed; Koroidov, Sergey; Roessler, Christian G.; Allaire, Marc; Sierra, Raymond G.; Docker, Peter T.; Glownia, James M.; Nelson, Silke; Koglin, Jason E.; Zhu, Diling; Chollet, Matthieu; Song, Sanghoon; Lemke, Henrik; Liang, Mengning; Sokaras, Dimosthenis; Alonso-Mori, Roberto; Zouni, Athina; Messinger, Johannes; Bergmann, Uwe; Boal, Amie K.; Bollinger, J. Martin; Krebs, Carsten; Högbom, Martin; Phillips, George N.; Vierstra, Richard D.; Sauter, Nicholas K.; Orville, Allen M.; Kern, Jan; Yachandra, Vittal K.; Yano, Junko

2017-01-01

X-ray crystallography at X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) sources is a powerful method for studying macromolecules at biologically relevant temperatures. Moreover, when combined with complementary techniques like X-ray emission spectroscopy (XES), both global structures and chemical properties of metalloenzymes can be obtained concurrently, providing new insights into the interplay between the protein structure/dynamics and chemistry at an active site. Implementing such a multimodal approach can be compromised by conflicting requirements to optimize each individual method. In particular, the method used for sample delivery greatly impacts the data quality. We present here a new, robust way of delivering controlled sample amounts on demand using acoustic droplet ejection coupled with a conveyor belt drive that is optimized for crystallography and spectroscopy measurements of photochemical and chemical reactions over a wide range of time scales. Studies with photosystem II, the phytochrome photoreceptor, and ribonucleotide reductase R2 illustrate the power and versatility of this method. PMID:28250468

Ceramic micro-injection molded nozzles for serial femtosecond crystallography sample delivery

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Beyerlein, K. R.; Adriano, L.; Heymann, M.; Kirian, R.; Knoška, J.; Wilde, F.; Chapman, H. N.; Bajt, S.

2015-12-01

Serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) using X-ray Free-Electron Lasers (XFELs) allows for room temperature protein structure determination without evidence of conventional radiation damage. In this method, a liquid suspension of protein microcrystals can be delivered to the X-ray beam in vacuum as a micro-jet, which replenishes the crystals at a rate that exceeds the current XFEL pulse repetition rate. Gas dynamic virtual nozzles produce the required micrometer-sized streams by the focusing action of a coaxial sheath gas and have been shown to be effective for SFX experiments. Here, we describe the design and characterization of such nozzles assembled from ceramic micro-injection molded outer gas-focusing capillaries. Trends of the emitted jet diameter and jet length as a function of supplied liquid and gas flow rates are measured by a fast imaging system. The observed trends are explained by derived relationships considering choked gas flow and liquid flow conservation. Finally, the performance of these nozzles in a SFX experiment is presented, including an analysis of the observed background.

Insights into photosystem II from isomorphous difference Fourier maps of femtosecond X-ray diffraction data and quantum mechanics/molecular mechanics structural models

DOE PAGES

Wang, Jimin; Askerka, Mikhail; Brudvig, Gary W.; ...

2017-01-12

Understanding structure–function relations in photosystem II (PSII) is important for the development of biomimetic photocatalytic systems. X-ray crystallography, computational modeling, and spectroscopy have played central roles in elucidating the structure and function of PSII. Recent breakthroughs in femtosecond X-ray crystallography offer the possibility of collecting diffraction data from the X-ray free electron laser (XFEL) before radiation damage of the sample, thereby overcoming the main challenge of conventional X-ray diffraction methods. However, the interpretation of XFEL data from PSII intermediates is challenging because of the issues regarding data-processing, uncertainty on the precise positions of light oxygen atoms next to heavy metalmore » centers, and different kinetics of the S-state transition in microcrystals compared to solution. Lastly, we summarize recent advances and outstanding challenges in PSII structure–function determination with emphasis on the implementation of quantum mechanics/molecular mechanics techniques combined with isomorphous difference Fourier maps, direct methods, and high-resolution spectroscopy.« less

High-resolution single-shot spectral monitoring of hard x-ray free-electron laser radiation

DOE PAGES

Makita, M.; Karvinen, P.; Zhu, D.; ...

2015-10-16

We have developed an on-line spectrometer for hard x-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) radiation based on a nanostructured diamond diffraction grating and a bent crystal analyzer. Our method provides high spectral resolution, interferes negligibly with the XFEL beam, and can withstand the intense hard x-ray pulses at high repetition rates of >100 Hz. The spectrometer is capable of providing shot-to-shot spectral information for the normalization of data obtained in scientific experiments and optimization of the accelerator operation parameters. We have demonstrated these capabilities of the setup at the Linac Coherent Light Source, in self-amplified spontaneous emission mode at full energy ofmore » >1 mJ with a 120 Hz repetition rate, obtaining a resolving power of Ε/δΕ > 3 × 10 4. In conclusion, the device was also used to monitor the effects of pulse duration down to 8 fs by analysis of the spectral spike width.« less

High-intensity double-pulse X-ray free-electron laser

DOE PAGES

Marinelli, A.; Ratner, D.; Lutman, A. A.; ...

2015-03-06

The X-ray free-electron laser has opened a new era for photon science, improving the X-ray brightness by ten orders of magnitude over previously available sources. Similar to an optical laser, the spectral and temporal structure of the radiation pulses can be tailored to the specific needs of many experiments by accurately manipulating the lasing medium, that is, the electron beam. Here we report the generation of mJ-level two-colour hard X-ray pulses of few femtoseconds duration with an XFEL driven by twin electron bunches at the Linac Coherent Light Source. This performance represents an improvement of over an order of magnitudemore » in peak power over state-of-the-art two-colour XFELs. The unprecedented intensity and temporal coherence of this new two-colour X-ray free-electron laser enable an entirely new set of scientific applications, ranging from X-ray pump/X-ray probe experiments to the imaging of complex biological samples with multiple wavelength anomalous dispersion.« less

Insights into Photosystem II from Isomorphous Difference Fourier Maps of Femtosecond X-ray Diffraction Data and Quantum Mechanics/Molecular Mechanics Structural Models.

PubMed

Wang, Jimin; Askerka, Mikhail; Brudvig, Gary W; Batista, Victor S

2017-02-10

Understanding structure-function relations in photosystem II (PSII) is important for the development of biomimetic photocatalytic systems. X-ray crystallography, computational modeling, and spectroscopy have played central roles in elucidating the structure and function of PSII. Recent breakthroughs in femtosecond X-ray crystallography offer the possibility of collecting diffraction data from the X-ray free electron laser (XFEL) before radiation damage of the sample, thereby overcoming the main challenge of conventional X-ray diffraction methods. However, the interpretation of XFEL data from PSII intermediates is challenging because of the issues regarding data-processing, uncertainty on the precise positions of light oxygen atoms next to heavy metal centers, and different kinetics of the S-state transition in microcrystals compared to solution. Here, we summarize recent advances and outstanding challenges in PSII structure-function determination with emphasis on the implementation of quantum mechanics/molecular mechanics techniques combined with isomorphous difference Fourier maps, direct methods, and high-resolution spectroscopy.

Insights into photosystem II from isomorphous difference Fourier maps of femtosecond X-ray diffraction data and quantum mechanics/molecular mechanics structural models

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Wang, Jimin; Askerka, Mikhail; Brudvig, Gary W.

Understanding structure–function relations in photosystem II (PSII) is important for the development of biomimetic photocatalytic systems. X-ray crystallography, computational modeling, and spectroscopy have played central roles in elucidating the structure and function of PSII. Recent breakthroughs in femtosecond X-ray crystallography offer the possibility of collecting diffraction data from the X-ray free electron laser (XFEL) before radiation damage of the sample, thereby overcoming the main challenge of conventional X-ray diffraction methods. However, the interpretation of XFEL data from PSII intermediates is challenging because of the issues regarding data-processing, uncertainty on the precise positions of light oxygen atoms next to heavy metalmore » centers, and different kinetics of the S-state transition in microcrystals compared to solution. Lastly, we summarize recent advances and outstanding challenges in PSII structure–function determination with emphasis on the implementation of quantum mechanics/molecular mechanics techniques combined with isomorphous difference Fourier maps, direct methods, and high-resolution spectroscopy.« less

Fixed target matrix for femtosecond time-resolved and in situ serial micro-crystallography

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Mueller, C.; Marx, A.; Epp, S. W.

We present a crystallography chip enabling in situ room temperature crystallography at microfocus synchrotron beamlines and X-ray free-electron laser (X-FEL) sources. Compared to other in situ approaches, we observe extremely low background and high diffraction data quality. The chip design is robust and allows fast and efficient loading of thousands of small crystals. The ability to load a large number of protein crystals, at room temperature and with high efficiency, into prescribed positions enables high throughput automated serial crystallography with microfocus synchrotron beamlines. In addition, we demonstrate the application of this chip for femtosecond time-resolved serial crystallography at the Linacmore » Coherent Light Source (LCLS, Menlo Park, California, USA). As a result, the chip concept enables multiple images to be acquired from each crystal, allowing differential detection of changes in diffraction intensities in order to obtain high signal-to-noise and fully exploit the time resolution capabilities of XFELs.« less

Acoustic Injectors for Drop-On-Demand Serial Femtosecond Crystallography

DOE PAGES

Roessler, Christian G.; Agarwal, Rakhi; Allaire, Marc; ...

2016-03-17

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) provide very intense X-ray pulses suitable for macromolecular crystallography. Each X-ray pulse typically lasts for tens of femtoseconds and the interval between pulses is many orders of magnitude longer. Here we describe two novel acoustic injection systems that use focused sound waves to eject picoliter to nanoliter crystal-containing droplets out of microplates and into the X-ray pulse from which diffraction data are collected. The on-demand droplet delivery is synchronized to the XFEL pulse scheme, resulting in X-ray pulses intersecting up to 88% of the droplets. We tested several types of samples in a range of crystallizationmore » conditions, wherein the overall crystal hit ratio (e.g., fraction of images with observable diffraction patterns) is a function of the microcrystal slurry concentration. Lastly, we report crystal structures from lysozyme, thermolysin, and stachydrine demethylase (Stc2). In addition, samples were screened to demonstrate that these methods can be applied to rare samples« less

Acoustic Injectors for Drop-On-Demand Serial Femtosecond Crystallography

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Roessler, Christian G.; Agarwal, Rakhi; Allaire, Marc

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) provide very intense X-ray pulses suitable for macromolecular crystallography. Each X-ray pulse typically lasts for tens of femtoseconds and the interval between pulses is many orders of magnitude longer. Here we describe two novel acoustic injection systems that use focused sound waves to eject picoliter to nanoliter crystal-containing droplets out of microplates and into the X-ray pulse from which diffraction data are collected. The on-demand droplet delivery is synchronized to the XFEL pulse scheme, resulting in X-ray pulses intersecting up to 88% of the droplets. We tested several types of samples in a range of crystallizationmore » conditions, wherein the overall crystal hit ratio (e.g., fraction of images with observable diffraction patterns) is a function of the microcrystal slurry concentration. We report crystal structures from lysozyme, thermolysin, and stachydrine demethylase (Stc2). Additional samples were screened to demonstrate that these methods can be applied to rare samples.« less

Acoustic Injectors for Drop-On-Demand Serial Femtosecond Crystallography

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Roessler, Christian G.; Agarwal, Rakhi; Allaire, Marc

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) provide very intense X-ray pulses suitable for macromolecular crystallography. Each X-ray pulse typically lasts for tens of femtoseconds and the interval between pulses is many orders of magnitude longer. Here we describe two novel acoustic injection systems that use focused sound waves to eject picoliter to nanoliter crystal-containing droplets out of microplates and into the X-ray pulse from which diffraction data are collected. The on-demand droplet delivery is synchronized to the XFEL pulse scheme, resulting in X-ray pulses intersecting up to 88% of the droplets. We tested several types of samples in a range of crystallizationmore » conditions, wherein the overall crystal hit ratio (e.g., fraction of images with observable diffraction patterns) is a function of the microcrystal slurry concentration. Lastly, we report crystal structures from lysozyme, thermolysin, and stachydrine demethylase (Stc2). In addition, samples were screened to demonstrate that these methods can be applied to rare samples« less

Fixed target matrix for femtosecond time-resolved and in situ serial micro-crystallography

DOE PAGES

Mueller, C.; Marx, A.; Epp, S. W.; ...

2015-08-18

We present a crystallography chip enabling in situ room temperature crystallography at microfocus synchrotron beamlines and X-ray free-electron laser (X-FEL) sources. Compared to other in situ approaches, we observe extremely low background and high diffraction data quality. The chip design is robust and allows fast and efficient loading of thousands of small crystals. The ability to load a large number of protein crystals, at room temperature and with high efficiency, into prescribed positions enables high throughput automated serial crystallography with microfocus synchrotron beamlines. In addition, we demonstrate the application of this chip for femtosecond time-resolved serial crystallography at the Linacmore » Coherent Light Source (LCLS, Menlo Park, California, USA). As a result, the chip concept enables multiple images to be acquired from each crystal, allowing differential detection of changes in diffraction intensities in order to obtain high signal-to-noise and fully exploit the time resolution capabilities of XFELs.« less

X-ray absorption spectroscopy using a self-seeded soft X-ray free-electron laser

PubMed Central

Kroll, Thomas; Kern, Jan; Kubin, Markus; Ratner, Daniel; Gul, Sheraz; Fuller, Franklin D.; Löchel, Heike; Krzywinski, Jacek; Lutman, Alberto; Ding, Yuantao; Dakovski, Georgi L.; Moeller, Stefan; Turner, Joshua J.; Alonso-Mori, Roberto; Nordlund, Dennis L.; Rehanek, Jens; Weniger, Christian; Firsov, Alexander; Brzhezinskaya, Maria; Chatterjee, Ruchira; Lassalle-Kaiser, Benedikt; Sierra, Raymond G.; Laksmono, Hartawan; Hill, Ethan; Borovik, Andrew; Erko, Alexei; Föhlisch, Alexander; Mitzner, Rolf; Yachandra, Vittal K.; Yano, Junko; Wernet, Philippe; Bergmann, Uwe

2016-01-01

X-ray free electron lasers (XFELs) enable unprecedented new ways to study the electronic structure and dynamics of transition metal systems. L-edge absorption spectroscopy is a powerful technique for such studies and the feasibility of this method at XFELs for solutions and solids has been demonstrated. However, the required x-ray bandwidth is an order of magnitude narrower than that of self-amplified spontaneous emission (SASE), and additional monochromatization is needed. Here we compare L-edge x-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS) of a prototypical transition metal system based on monochromatizing the SASE radiation of the linac coherent light source (LCLS) with a new technique based on self-seeding of LCLS. We demonstrate how L-edge XAS can be performed using the self-seeding scheme without the need of an additional beam line monochromator. We show how the spectral shape and pulse energy depend on the undulator setup and how this affects the x-ray spectroscopy measurements. PMID:27828320

Double Emittance Exchanger as a Bunch Compressor for the MaRIE XFEL electron beam line at 1GeV

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Malyzhenkov, Alexander; Yampolsky, Nikolai; Carlsten, Bruce Eric

We demonstrate an alternative realization of a bunch compressor (specifically the second bunch compressor for the MaRIE XFEL beamline, 1GeV electron energy) using a double emittance exchanger (EEX) and a telescope in the transverse phase space.We compare our results with a traditional bunch compressor realized via chicane, taking into account the nonlinear dynamics, Coherent Synchrotron Radiation (CSR) and Space Charge (SC) effects. In particular, we use the Elegant code for tracking particles through the beam line and analyze the eigen-emittances evolution to separate the influence of the CSR/SC effects from the nonlinear dynamics effects. We optimize the scheme parameters tomore » reach a desirable compression factor and minimize the emittance growth. We observe dominant CSR-effects in our scheme resulting in critical emittance growth and introduce alternative version of an emittance exchanger with a reduced number of bending magnets to minimize the impact of CSR effects.« less

Catalysis in real time using x-ray lasers

DOE PAGES

Nilsson, A.; LaRue, J.; Öberg, H.; ...

2017-02-14

Here, we describe how the unique temporal and spectral characteristics of X-ray free-electron lasers (XFEL) can be utilized to follow chemical transformations in heterogeneous catalysis in real time. We highlight the systematic study of CO oxidation on Ru(0 0 0 1), which we initiate either using a femtosecond pulse from an optical laser or by activating only the oxygen atoms using a THz pulse. We find that CO is promoted into an entropy-controlled precursor state prior to desorbing when the surface is heated in the absence of oxygen, whereas in the presence of oxygen, CO desorbs directly into the gasmore » phase. We monitor the activation of atomic oxygen explicitly by the reduced split between bonding and antibonding orbitals as the oxygen comes out of the strongly bound hollow position. Applying these novel XFEL techniques to the full oxidation reaction resulted in the surprising observation of a significant fraction of the reactants at the transition state through the electronic signature of the new bond formation.« less

Nano-structuring of multi-layer material by single x-ray vortex pulse with femtosecond duration

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kohmura, Yoshiki; Zhakhovsky, Vasily; Takei, Dai; Suzuki, Yoshio; Takeuchi, Akihisa; Inoue, Ichiro; Inubushi, Yuichi; Inogamov, Nail; Ishikawa, Tetsuya; Yabashi, Makina

2018-03-01

A narrow zero-intensity spot arising from an x-ray vortex has huge potential for future applications such as nanoscopy and nanofabrication. We here present an X-ray Free Electron Laser (XFEL) experiment with a focused vortex wavefront which generated high aspect ratio nanoneedles on a Cr/Au multi-layer (ML) specimen. A sharp needle with a typical width and height of 310 and 600 nm was formed with a high occurrence rate at the center of a 7.71 keV x-ray vortex on this ML specimen, respectively. The observed width exceeds the diffraction limit, and the smallest structures ever reported using an intense-XFEL ablation were fabricated. We found that the elemental composition of the nanoneedles shows a significant difference from that of the unaffected area of Cr/Au ML. All these results are well explained by the molecular dynamics simulations, leading to the elucidation of the needle formation mechanism on an ultra-fast timescale.

Femtosecond synchronism of x-rays and visible/infrared light in an x-ray free-electron laser

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Adams, B. W.

2007-12-15

A way is proposed to obtain ultrashort pulses of intense infrared/visible light in few-femtosecond synchronism with x-rays from an x-ray free-electron laser (XFEL). It makes use of the recently proposed emittance-slicing technique [Emma et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 92, 074801 (2004)] to both restrict the duration of self-amplified spontaneous emission (SASE) to a few femtoseconds and to lead to a coherence enhancement of near-infrared transition undulator radiation (CTUR). The x-rays and the near-infrared light originate within the XFEL undulator from the same slice of electrons within a bunch and are therefore perfectly synchronized with each other. An example of realizingmore » the scheme at the Linac Coherent Light Source is presented. A few side issues are explored briefly, such as the magnitude of the velocity term versus the acceleration term in the Lienard-Wiechert fields and the possible use of the CTUR as a diagnostic tool for the SASE process itself.« less

Free-electron-laser coherent diffraction images of individual drug-carrying liposome particles in solution.

PubMed

Huang, Chi-Feng; Liang, Keng S; Hsu, Tsui-Ling; Lee, Tsung-Tse; Chen, Yi-Yun; Yang, Shun-Min; Chen, Hsiang-Hsin; Huang, Shih-Hsin; Chang, Wei-Hau; Lee, Ting-Kuo; Chen, Peilin; Peng, Kuei-En; Chen, Chien-Chun; Shi, Cheng-Zhi; Hu, Yu-Fang; Margaritondo, Giorgio; Ishikawa, Tetsuya; Wong, Chi-Huey; Hwu, Y

2018-02-08

Using the excellent performances of a SACLA (RIKEN/HARIMA, Japan) X-ray free electron laser (X-FEL), coherent diffraction imaging (CDI) was used to detect individual liposome particles in water, with or without inserted doxorubicin nanorods. This was possible because of the electron density differences between the carrier, the liposome, and the drug. The result is important since liposome nanocarriers at present dominate drug delivery systems. In spite of the low cross-section of the original ingredients, the diffracted intensity of drug-free liposomes was sufficient for spatial reconstruction yielding quantitative structural information. For particles containing doxorubicin, the structural parameters of the nanorods could be extracted from CDI. Furthermore, the measurement of the electron density of the solution enclosed in each liposome provides direct evidence of the incorporation of ammonium sulphate into the nanorods. Overall, ours is an important test for extending the X-FEL analysis of individual nanoparticles to low cross-sectional systems in solution, and also for its potential use to optimize the manufacturing of drug nanocarriers.

Overview of Best Practices in Mitigating the Impact of Natural Disasters and Extreme Weather Phenomena on European Aviation - The MOWE-IT Project

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Muehlhausen, Thorsten; Kreuz, Michael; Temme, Annette; Nokkala, Marko; Nurmi, Pertti; Perrels, Adriaan; Hyvarinen, Otto; Yuga, Ilkka; Pylkko, Pirkko; Kral, Stephan; Schaetter, Frank; Bartsch, Mariana; Wiens, Marcus; Michaelides, Silas; Tymvios, Filippos; Papadakis, Matheos; Athanasatos, Spyros

2014-05-01

The European transport system has shown various degrees of vulnerability to external shocks such as severe weather events, which have partially or, in some cases, totally shut down part of the transport system. Under climate change conditions, the identification of Best Practices within the European area and the proposal of short, medium and long term solutions in order to deal with induced disruptions are vital to upkeep the efficiency and integrity of the European transport network. The MOWE-IT (Management of weather events in the transport system) project is a continuation of the work performed in up-to-date European projects such as the EWENT, WEATHER and ECCONET projects. Its aim is to identify such existing best practices and to develop methodologies in order to assist transport operators, authorities and transport system users to mitigate the impact of natural disasters and extreme weather phenomena on transport system performance. While the MOWE-IT project covers a wide number of transportation modes such as road, rail, marine transport, aviation and inland waterways, in this current work, an overview of the project's work performed in the aviation sector in Europe is presented. The MOWE-IT project is funded by the European Union, under its 7th Framework Programme (TRANSPORT SUPPORT ACTIONS).

The Organization of European Cancer Institute Pathobiology Working Group and its support of European biobanking infrastructures for translational cancer research.

PubMed

Riegman, Peter H J; de Jong, Bas W D; Llombart-Bosch, Antonio

2010-04-01

Today's translational cancer research increasingly depends on international multi-center studies. Biobanking infrastructure or comprehensive sample exchange platforms to enable networking of clinical cancer biobanks are instrumental to facilitate communication, uniform sample quality, and rules for exchange. The Organization of European Cancer Institutes (OECI) Pathobiology Working Group supports European biobanking infrastructure by maintaining the OECI-TuBaFrost exchange platform and organizing regular meetings. This platform originated from a European Commission project and is updated with knowledge from ongoing and new biobanking projects. This overview describes how European biobanking projects that have a large impact on clinical biobanking, including EuroBoNeT, SPIDIA, and BBMRI, contribute to the update of the OECI-TuBaFrost exchange platform. Combining the results of these European projects enabled the creation of an open (upon valid registration only) catalogue view of cancer biobanks and their available samples to initiate research projects. In addition, closed environments supporting active projects could be developed together with the latest views on quality, access rules, ethics, and law. With these contributions, the OECI Pathobiology Working Group contributes to and stimulates a professional attitude within biobanks at the European comprehensive cancer centers. Improving the fundamentals of cancer sample exchange in Europe stimulates the performance of large multi-center studies, resulting in experiments with the desired statistical significance outcome. With this approach, future innovation in cancer patient care can be realized faster and more reliably.

A Descriptive Review of Mainline E-Learning Projects in the European Union: E-Learning Action Plan and E-Learning Program

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Uzunboylu, Huseyin

2006-01-01

This study's purpose was to survey the literature on European Union (EU) e-learning strategies specifically related to two mainline e-learning projects: the learning Action Plan and the E-Learning Program. Results of the evaluation and interpretation of the literature show that the European Commission has positively impacted European Union…

New European Training Network to Improve Young Scientists' Capabilities in Computational Wave Propagation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Igel, Heiner

2004-07-01

The European Commission recently funded a Marie-Curie Research Training Network (MCRTN) in the field of computational seismology within the 6th Framework Program. SPICE (Seismic wave Propagation and Imaging in Complex media: a European network) is coordinated by the computational seismology group of the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität in Munich linking 14 European research institutions in total. The 4-year project will provide funding for 14 Ph.D. students (3-year projects) and 14 postdoctoral positions (2-year projects) within the various fields of computational seismology. These positions have been advertised and are currently being filled.

European Industrial Doctorates: Marie Curie Actions

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

European Commission, 2012

2012-01-01

European industrial doctorates are joint doctoral training projects funded by the European Union (EU) and open to all research fields. The project brings together an academic participant (university, research institution, etc.) and a company. They have to be established in two different EU Member States or associated countries. Associated partners…

Novel active signal compression in low-noise analog readout at future X-ray FEL facilities

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Manghisoni, M.; Comotti, D.; Gaioni, L.; Lodola, L.; Ratti, L.; Re, V.; Traversi, G.; Vacchi, C.

2015-04-01

This work presents the design of a low-noise front-end implementing a novel active signal compression technique. This feature can be exploited in the design of analog readout channels for application to the next generation free electron laser (FEL) experiments. The readout architecture includes the low-noise charge sensitive amplifier (CSA) with dynamic signal compression, a time variant shaper used to process the signal at the preamplifier output and a 10-bit successive approximation register (SAR) analog-to-digital converter (ADC). The channel will be operated in such a way to cope with the high frame rate (exceeding 1 MHz) foreseen for future XFEL machines. The choice of a 65 nm CMOS technology has been made in order to include all the building blocks in the target pixel pitch of 100 μm. This work has been carried out in the frame of the PixFEL Project funded by the Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare (INFN), Italy.

Superconducting cavity material for the European XFEL

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Singer, W.; Singer, X.; Brinkmann, A.; Iversen, J.; Matheisen, A.; Navitski, A.; Tamashevich, Y.; Michelato, P.; Monaco, L.

2015-08-01

Analysis of the strategy for superconducting cavity material procurement and quality management is done on the basis of the experience with the cavity production for the European x-ray free electron laser (EXFEL) facility. An adjustment of the material specification to EXFEL requirements, procurement of material, quality control (QC), documentation, and shipment to cavity producers have been worked out and carried out by DESY. A multistep process of qualification of the material suppliers included detailed material testing, single- and nine-cell cavity fabrication, and cryogenic radiofrequency tests. Production of about 25 000 semi-finished parts of high purity niobium and niobium-titanium alloy in a period of three years has been divided finally between companies Heraeus, Tokyo Denkai, Ningxia OTIC, and PLANSEE. Consideration of large-grain (LG) material as a possible option for the EXFEL has resulted in the production of one cryogenic module consisting of seven (out of eight) LG cavities. LG materials fulfilled the EXFEL requirements and showed even 25% to 30% higher unloaded quality factor. A possible shortage of the required quantity of LG material on the market led, however, to the choice of conventional fine-grain (FG) material. Eddy-current scanning (ECS) has been applied as an additional QC tool for the niobium sheets and contributed significantly to the material qualification and sorting. Two percent of the sheets have been rejected, which potentially could affect up to one-third of the cavities. The main imperfections and defects in the rejected sheets have been analyzed. Samples containing foreign material inclusions have been extracted from the sheets and electrochemically polished. Some inclusions remained even after 150 μm surface layer removal. Indications of foreign material inclusions have been found in the industrially fabricated and treated cavities and a deeper analysis of the defects has been performed.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Robinson, Ian; Clark, Jesse; Harder, Ross

Materials are generally classified by a phase diagram which displays their properties as a function of external state variables, typically temperature and pressure. A new dimension that is relatively unexplored is time: a rich variety of new materials can become accessible in the transient period following laser excitation from the ground state. The timescale of nanoseconds to femtoseconds, is ripe for investigation using x-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) methods. There is no shortage of materials suitable for time-resolved materials-science exploration. Oxides alone represent most of the minerals making up the Earth's crust, catalysts, ferroelectrics, corrosion products and electronically ordered materials suchmore » as superconductors, to name a few. Some of the elements have metastable phase diagrams with predicted new phases. There are some examples known already: an oxide 'hidden phase' living only nanoseconds and an electronically ordered excited phase of fullerene C 60, lasting only femtoseconds. In a completely general way, optically excited states of materials can be probed with Bragg coherent diffraction imaging, both below the damage threshold and in the destructive regime. Lastly, prospective methods for carrying out such XFEL experiments are discussed.« less

Experimental demonstration of fresh bunch self-seeding in an X-ray free electron laser

DOE PAGES

Emma, C.; Lutman, A.; Guetg, M. W.; ...

2017-04-10

Here, we report the generation of ultrahigh brightness X-ray pulses using the Fresh Bunch Self-Seeding (FBSS) method in an X-ray Free Electron Laser (XFEL). The FBSS method uses two different electron slices or bunches, one to generate the seed and the other to amplify it after the monochromator. This method circumvents the trade-off between the seed power and electron slice energy spread, which limits the efficiency of regular self-seeded FELs. The experiment, the performance of which is limited by existing hardware, shows FBSS feasibility, generating 5.5 keV photon pulses which are 9 fs long and of 7.3 ×10 –5 bandwidthmore » and 50 GW power. FBSS performance is compared with Self Amplified Spontaneous Emission/self-seeding performance, measuring a brightness increase of twelve/two times, respectively. In an optimized XFEL, FBSS can increase the peak power a hundred times more than state-of-the-art to multi-TW, opening new research areas for nonlinear science and single molecule imaging.« less

Ceramic micro-injection molded nozzles for serial femtosecond crystallography sample delivery

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Beyerlein, K. R.; Adriano, L.; Heymann, M.

Serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) using X-ray Free-Electron Lasers (XFELs) allows for room temperature protein structure determination without evidence of conventional radiation damage. In this method, a liquid suspension of protein microcrystals can be delivered to the X-ray beam in vacuum as a micro-jet, which replenishes the crystals at a rate that exceeds the current XFEL pulse repetition rate. Gas dynamic virtual nozzles produce the required micrometer-sized streams by the focusing action of a coaxial sheath gas and have been shown to be effective for SFX experiments. Here, we describe the design and characterization of such nozzles assembled from ceramic micro-injectionmore » molded outer gas-focusing capillaries. Trends of the emitted jet diameter and jet length as a function of supplied liquid and gas flow rates are measured by a fast imaging system. The observed trends are explained by derived relationships considering choked gas flow and liquidflow conservation. In conclusion, the performance of these nozzles in a SFX experiment is presented, including an analysis of the observed background.« less

Metalloprotein structures at ambient conditions and in real-time: biological crystallography and spectroscopy using X-ray free electron lasers

DOE PAGES

Kern, Jan; Yachandra, Vittal K.; Yano, Junko

2015-09-02

We have studied the structure of enzymes and the chemistry at the catalytic sites, intensively and have acquired an understanding of the atomic-scale chemistry which requires a new approach beyond steady state X-ray crystallography and X-ray spectroscopy at cryogenic temperatures. Following the dynamic changes in the geometric and electronic structure of metallo-enzymes at ambient conditions, while overcoming the severe X-ray-induced changes to the redox active catalytic center, is key for deriving reaction mechanisms. Such studies become possible by the intense and ultra-short femtosecond (fs) X-ray pulses from an X-ray free electron laser (XFEL) by acquiring a signal before the samplemore » is destroyed. Our review describes the recent and pioneering uses of XFELs to study the protein structure and dynamics of metallo-enzymes using crystallography and scattering, as well as the chemical structure and dynamics of the catalytic complexes (charge, spin, and covalency) using spectroscopy during the reaction to understand the electron-transfer processes and elucidate the mechanism.« less

Preparation of microcrystals in lipidic cubic phase for serial femtosecond crystallography.

PubMed

Liu, Wei; Ishchenko, Andrii; Cherezov, Vadim

2014-09-01

We have recently established a procedure for serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) in lipidic cubic phase (LCP) for protein structure determination at X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs). LCP-SFX uses the gel-like LCP as a matrix for growth and delivery of membrane protein microcrystals for crystallographic data collection. LCP is a liquid-crystalline mesophase composed of lipids and water. It provides a membrane-mimicking environment that stabilizes membrane proteins and supports their crystallization. Here we describe detailed procedures for the preparation and characterization of microcrystals for LCP-SFX applications. The advantages of LCP-SFX over traditional crystallographic methods include the capability of collecting room-temperature high-resolution data with minimal effects of radiation damage from sub-10-μm crystals of membrane and soluble proteins that are difficult to crystallize, while eliminating the need for crystal harvesting and cryo-cooling. Compared with SFX methods for microcrystals in solution using liquid injectors, LCP-SFX reduces protein consumption by 2-3 orders of magnitude for data collection at currently available XFELs. The whole procedure typically takes 3-5 d, including the time required for the crystals to grow.

Ceramic micro-injection molded nozzles for serial femtosecond crystallography sample delivery

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Beyerlein, K. R.; Heymann, M.; Kirian, R.

Serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) using X-ray Free-Electron Lasers (XFELs) allows for room temperature protein structure determination without evidence of conventional radiation damage. In this method, a liquid suspension of protein microcrystals can be delivered to the X-ray beam in vacuum as a micro-jet, which replenishes the crystals at a rate that exceeds the current XFEL pulse repetition rate. Gas dynamic virtual nozzles produce the required micrometer-sized streams by the focusing action of a coaxial sheath gas and have been shown to be effective for SFX experiments. Here, we describe the design and characterization of such nozzles assembled from ceramic micro-injectionmore » molded outer gas-focusing capillaries. Trends of the emitted jet diameter and jet length as a function of supplied liquid and gas flow rates are measured by a fast imaging system. The observed trends are explained by derived relationships considering choked gas flow and liquid flow conservation. Finally, the performance of these nozzles in a SFX experiment is presented, including an analysis of the observed background.« less

Ceramic micro-injection molded nozzles for serial femtosecond crystallography sample delivery

DOE PAGES

Beyerlein, K. R.; Adriano, L.; Heymann, M.; ...

2015-12-08

Serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) using X-ray Free-Electron Lasers (XFELs) allows for room temperature protein structure determination without evidence of conventional radiation damage. In this method, a liquid suspension of protein microcrystals can be delivered to the X-ray beam in vacuum as a micro-jet, which replenishes the crystals at a rate that exceeds the current XFEL pulse repetition rate. Gas dynamic virtual nozzles produce the required micrometer-sized streams by the focusing action of a coaxial sheath gas and have been shown to be effective for SFX experiments. Here, we describe the design and characterization of such nozzles assembled from ceramic micro-injectionmore » molded outer gas-focusing capillaries. Trends of the emitted jet diameter and jet length as a function of supplied liquid and gas flow rates are measured by a fast imaging system. The observed trends are explained by derived relationships considering choked gas flow and liquidflow conservation. In conclusion, the performance of these nozzles in a SFX experiment is presented, including an analysis of the observed background.« less

Metalloprotein structures at ambient conditions and in real-time: biological crystallography and spectroscopy using X-ray free electron lasers

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Kern, Jan; Yachandra, Vittal K.; Yano, Junko

We have studied the structure of enzymes and the chemistry at the catalytic sites, intensively and have acquired an understanding of the atomic-scale chemistry which requires a new approach beyond steady state X-ray crystallography and X-ray spectroscopy at cryogenic temperatures. Following the dynamic changes in the geometric and electronic structure of metallo-enzymes at ambient conditions, while overcoming the severe X-ray-induced changes to the redox active catalytic center, is key for deriving reaction mechanisms. Such studies become possible by the intense and ultra-short femtosecond (fs) X-ray pulses from an X-ray free electron laser (XFEL) by acquiring a signal before the samplemore » is destroyed. Our review describes the recent and pioneering uses of XFELs to study the protein structure and dynamics of metallo-enzymes using crystallography and scattering, as well as the chemical structure and dynamics of the catalytic complexes (charge, spin, and covalency) using spectroscopy during the reaction to understand the electron-transfer processes and elucidate the mechanism.« less

Batch crystallization of rhodopsin for structural dynamics using an X-ray free-electron laser

DOE PAGES

Wu, Wenting; Nogly, Przemyslaw; Rheinberger, Jan; ...

2015-06-27

Rhodopsin is a membrane protein from the G protein-coupled receptor family. Together with its ligand retinal, it forms the visual pigment responsible for night vision. In order to perform ultrafast dynamics studies, a time-resolved serial femtosecond crystallography method is required owing to the nonreversible activation of rhodopsin. In such an approach, microcrystals in suspension are delivered into the X-ray pulses of an X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) after a precise photoactivation delay. Here in this study, a millilitre batch production of high-density microcrystals was developed by four methodical conversion steps starting from known vapour-diffusion crystallization protocols: (i) screening the low-salt crystallizationmore » conditions preferred for serial crystallography by vapour diffusion, (ii) optimization of batch crystallization, (iii) testing the crystal size and quality using second-harmonic generation (SHG) imaging and X-ray powder diffraction and (iv) production of millilitres of rhodopsin crystal suspension in batches for serial crystallography tests; these crystals diffracted at an XFEL at the Linac Coherent Light Source using a liquid-jet setup.« less

Cryogenic coherent X-ray diffraction imaging of biological samples at SACLA: a correlative approach with cryo-electron and light microscopy.

PubMed

Takayama, Yuki; Yonekura, Koji

2016-03-01

Coherent X-ray diffraction imaging at cryogenic temperature (cryo-CXDI) allows the analysis of internal structures of unstained, non-crystalline, whole biological samples in micrometre to sub-micrometre dimensions. Targets include cells and cell organelles. This approach involves preparing frozen-hydrated samples under controlled humidity, transferring the samples to a cryo-stage inside a vacuum chamber of a diffractometer, and then exposing the samples to coherent X-rays. Since 2012, cryo-coherent diffraction imaging (CDI) experiments have been carried out with the X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) at the SPring-8 Ångstrom Compact free-electron LAser (SACLA) facility in Japan. Complementary use of cryo-electron microscopy and/or light microscopy is highly beneficial for both pre-checking samples and studying the integrity or nature of the sample. This article reports the authors' experience in cryo-XFEL-CDI of biological cells and organelles at SACLA, and describes an attempt towards reliable and higher-resolution reconstructions, including signal enhancement with strong scatterers and Patterson-search phasing.

X-ray free electron laser: opportunities for drug discovery.

PubMed

Cheng, Robert K Y; Abela, Rafael; Hennig, Michael

2017-11-08

Past decades have shown the impact of structural information derived from complexes of drug candidates with their protein targets to facilitate the discovery of safe and effective medicines. Despite recent developments in single particle cryo-electron microscopy, X-ray crystallography has been the main method to derive structural information. The unique properties of X-ray free electron laser (XFEL) with unmet peak brilliance and beam focus allow X-ray diffraction data recording and successful structure determination from smaller and weaker diffracting crystals shortening timelines in crystal optimization. To further capitalize on the XFEL advantage, innovations in crystal sample delivery for the X-ray experiment, data collection and processing methods are required. This development was a key contributor to serial crystallography allowing structure determination at room temperature yielding physiologically more relevant structures. Adding the time resolution provided by the femtosecond X-ray pulse will enable monitoring and capturing of dynamic processes of ligand binding and associated conformational changes with great impact to the design of candidate drug compounds. © 2017 The Author(s). Published by Portland Press Limited on behalf of the Biochemical Society.

Three-dimensional-printed gas dynamic virtual nozzles for x-ray laser sample delivery

PubMed Central

Nelson, Garrett; Kirian, Richard A.; Weierstall, Uwe; Zatsepin, Nadia A.; Faragó, Tomáš; Baumbach, Tilo; Wilde, Fabian; Niesler, Fabian B. P.; Zimmer, Benjamin; Ishigami, Izumi; Hikita, Masahide; Bajt, Saša; Yeh, Syun-Ru; Rousseau, Denis L.; Chapman, Henry N.; Spence, John C. H.; Heymann, Michael

2016-01-01

Reliable sample delivery is essential to biological imaging using X-ray Free Electron Lasers (XFELs). Continuous injection using the Gas Dynamic Virtual Nozzle (GDVN) has proven valuable, particularly for time-resolved studies. However, many important aspects of GDVN functionality have yet to be thoroughly understood and/or refined due to fabrication limitations. We report the application of 2-photon polymerization as a form of high-resolution 3D printing to fabricate high-fidelity GDVNs with submicron resolution. This technique allows rapid prototyping of a wide range of different types of nozzles from standard CAD drawings and optimization of crucial dimensions for optimal performance. Three nozzles were tested with pure water to determine general nozzle performance and reproducibility, with nearly reproducible off-axis jetting being the result. X-ray tomography and index matching were successfully used to evaluate the interior nozzle structures and identify the cause of off-axis jetting. Subsequent refinements to fabrication resulted in straight jetting. A performance test of printed nozzles at an XFEL provided high quality femtosecond diffraction patterns. PMID:27410079

Damage threshold of coating materials on x-ray mirror for x-ray free electron laser

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Koyama, Takahisa, E-mail: koyama@spring8.or.jp; Yumoto, Hirokatsu; Tono, Kensuke

2016-05-15

We evaluated the damage threshold of coating materials such as Mo, Ru, Rh, W, and Pt on Si substrates, and that of uncoated Si substrate, for mirror optics of X-ray free electron lasers (XFELs). Focused 1 μm (full width at half maximum) XFEL pulses with the energies of 5.5 and 10 keV, generated by the SPring-8 angstrom compact free electron laser (SACLA), were irradiated under the grazing incidence condition. The damage thresholds were evaluated by in situ measurements of X-ray reflectivity degradation during irradiation by multiple pulses. The measured damage fluences below the critical angles were sufficiently high compared withmore » the unfocused SACLA beam fluence. Rh coating was adopted for two mirror systems of SACLA. One system was a beamline transport mirror system that was partially coated with Rh for optional utilization of a pink beam in the photon energy range of more than 20 keV. The other was an improved version of the 1 μm focusing mirror system, and no damage was observed after one year of operation.« less

Accelerators for society: succession of European infrastructural projects: CARE, EuCARD, TIARA, EuCARD2

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Romaniuk, Ryszard S.

2013-10-01

Accelerator science and technology is one of a key enablers of the developments in the particle physic, photon physics and also applications in medicine and industry. The paper presents a digest of the research results in the domain of accelerator science and technology in Europe, shown during the realization of CARE (Coordinated Accelerator R&D), EuCARD (European Coordination of Accelerator R&D) and during the national annual review meeting of the TIARA - Test Infrastructure of European Research Area in Accelerator R&D. The European projects on accelerator technology started in 2003 with CARE. TIARA is an European Collaboration of Accelerator Technology, which by running research projects, technical, networks and infrastructural has a duty to integrate the research and technical communities and infrastructures in the global scale of Europe. The Collaboration gathers all research centers with large accelerator infrastructures. Other ones, like universities, are affiliated as associate members. TIARA-PP (preparatory phase) is an European infrastructural project run by this Consortium and realized inside EU-FP7. The paper presents a general overview of CARE, EuCARD and especially TIARA activities, with an introduction containing a portrait of contemporary accelerator technology and a digest of its applications in modern society. CARE, EuCARD and TIARA activities integrated the European accelerator community in a very effective way. These projects are expected very much to be continued.

Space and the complexity of European rules and policies: The common projects Galileo and GMES—precedence for a new European legal approach?

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Froehlich, Annette

2010-04-01

The two European flagship space projects, Galileo and GMES, clearly show that the current existing legal rules of the two organisations involved (European Union and European Space Agency) are not compatible. Moreover, it is quite impossible to implement a common project if every single organisation insists on the application of its own rules strictu sensu. Nevertheless, due to the political desire to advance these projects rapidly and to make them a success, legal obstacles were to be overcome. Consequently, recently concluded agreements between ESA and the EU-Commission concerning the financial and governmental matters of the Galileo and GMES implementation feature a new approach to cooperation between these two organisations. However, the question remains if they can be taken as precedence for a future institutionalised cooperation? It follows that the agreements have to be analysed in order to understand how a mutually acceptable agreement was reached despite the disparity in the rules of both organisations. In this regard, especially the financial decision agreement concerning Galileo in December 2007 shows a very interesting and unique way in applying EU-competition law. In the same way, the GMES-Delegation Agreement of spring 2008 is a good example of how two different legal systems can be applied to make a project success. Additionally, the reasons and arguments of both organisations have to be considered, especially once the Treaty of Lisbon will be in force. As these two main projects of the European Space Policy are characterized by the desire for a successful European cooperation, they can be regarded as an important step forward for a new legal approach. A new system emerges which could be taken into consideration for further common projects undertaken by ESA and the EU.

Patient participation in ERS guidelines and research projects: the EMBARC experience

PubMed Central

Timothy, Alan; Polverino, Eva; Almagro, Marta; Ruddy, Thomas; Powell, Pippa; Boyd, Jeanette

2017-01-01

The European Multicentre Bronchiectasis Audit and Research Collaboration (EMBARC) is a European Respiratory Society (ERS) Clinical Research Collaboration dedicated to improving research and clinical care for people with bronchiectasis. EMBARC has created a European Bronchiectasis Registry, funded by the ERS and by the European Union (EU) Innovative Medicines Initiative Programme. From the outset, EMBARC had the ambition to be a patient-focussed project. In contrast to many respiratory diseases, however, there are no specific patient charities or European patient organisations for patients with bronchiectasis and no existing infrastructure for patient engagement. This article describes the experience of EMBARC and the European Lung Foundation in establishing a patient advisory group and then engaging this group in European guidelines, an international registry and a series of research studies. Patient involvement in research, clinical guidelines and educational activities is increasingly advocated and increasingly important. Genuine patient engagement can achieve a number of goals that are critical to the success of an EU project, including focussing activities on patient priorities, allowing patients to direct the clinical and research agenda, and dissemination of guidelines and research findings to patients and the general public. Here, we review lessons learned and provide guidance for future ERS task forces, EU-funded projects or clinical research collaborations that are considering patient involvement. Educational aims To understand the different ways in which patients can contribute to clinical guidelines, research projects and educational activities. To understand the barriers and potential solutions to these barriers from a physician’s perspective, in order to ensure meaningful patient involvement in clinical projects. To understand the barriers and potential solutions from a patient’s perspective, in order to meaningfully involve patients in clinical projects. PMID:28894480

Patient participation in ERS guidelines and research projects: the EMBARC experience.

PubMed

Chalmers, James D; Timothy, Alan; Polverino, Eva; Almagro, Marta; Ruddy, Thomas; Powell, Pippa; Boyd, Jeanette

2017-09-01

The European Multicentre Bronchiectasis Audit and Research Collaboration (EMBARC) is a European Respiratory Society (ERS) Clinical Research Collaboration dedicated to improving research and clinical care for people with bronchiectasis. EMBARC has created a European Bronchiectasis Registry, funded by the ERS and by the European Union (EU) Innovative Medicines Initiative Programme. From the outset, EMBARC had the ambition to be a patient-focussed project. In contrast to many respiratory diseases, however, there are no specific patient charities or European patient organisations for patients with bronchiectasis and no existing infrastructure for patient engagement. This article describes the experience of EMBARC and the European Lung Foundation in establishing a patient advisory group and then engaging this group in European guidelines, an international registry and a series of research studies. Patient involvement in research, clinical guidelines and educational activities is increasingly advocated and increasingly important. Genuine patient engagement can achieve a number of goals that are critical to the success of an EU project, including focussing activities on patient priorities, allowing patients to direct the clinical and research agenda, and dissemination of guidelines and research findings to patients and the general public. Here, we review lessons learned and provide guidance for future ERS task forces, EU-funded projects or clinical research collaborations that are considering patient involvement. To understand the different ways in which patients can contribute to clinical guidelines, research projects and educational activities.To understand the barriers and potential solutions to these barriers from a physician's perspective, in order to ensure meaningful patient involvement in clinical projects.To understand the barriers and potential solutions from a patient's perspective, in order to meaningfully involve patients in clinical projects.

Adult Education and European Identity

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Negt, Oskar

2008-01-01

Europe is coming together. This is a historic project; for the first time in modern history, will and consciousness are used for bringing political, social and cultural unity to the European continent. In this process lifelong learning and hence adult education are gaining in importance. The European project takes place in an age characterised by…

The Practice of Media Education: International Research on Six European Countries

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Parola, Alberto; Ranieri, Maria

2011-01-01

This paper presents and discusses the results of OnAir, a European project on Media Education funded by the European Commission. This two-year project aimed at collecting, documenting, and developing media education practices across Europe, especially in Belgium, Bulgaria, Italy, Lithuania, Poland, and Romania. In particular, the paper focuses on…

The Politicisation and Securitisation of Religious Education? A Rejoinder

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Jackson, Robert

2015-01-01

I consider Liam Gearon's critique of what he calls the politicisation and securitisation of religious education, focusing on his criticisms of a European research project, the Religion in Education: a Contribution to Dialogue or a Factor of Conflict in Transforming Societies of European Countries? (REDCo) project funded by the European Commission…

Outline and Evaluation of a Joint European and Canadian Virtual Mobility: e-Learning Project

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hilliard, Alan

2006-01-01

The "virtual mobility" project was created as part of a joint Canadian and European Commission funded project to explore cross-cultural clinical curricular developments in the radiation sciences. The aim of the project was to facilitate student learning of the cross-cultural differences in the delivery of healthcare within the…

Is Europe Open to a Student-Oriented Framework for Literature? A Comparative Analysis of the Formal Literature Curriculum in Six European Countries

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Witte, Theo; Sâmihaian, Florentina

2013-01-01

This study is a comparative analysis of literary curricula in six European countries and is part of the project LiFT-2, funded by Comenius' Life Long Learning Programme of the European Commission. The result of this project, that involved almost 4,500 teachers, is a European literary framework for secondary education which can be described as a…

BiomarCaRE: rationale and design of the European BiomarCaRE project including 300,000 participants from 13 European countries.

PubMed

Zeller, Tanja; Hughes, Maria; Tuovinen, Tarja; Schillert, Arne; Conrads-Frank, Annette; Ruijter, Hester den; Schnabel, Renate B; Kee, Frank; Salomaa, Veikko; Siebert, Uwe; Thorand, Barbara; Ziegler, Andreas; Breek, Heico; Pasterkamp, Gerard; Kuulasmaa, Kari; Koenig, Wolfgang; Blankenberg, Stefan

2014-10-01

Biomarkers are considered as tools to enhance cardiovascular risk estimation. However, the value of biomarkers on risk estimation beyond European risk scores, their comparative impact among different European regions and their role towards personalised medicine remains uncertain. Biomarker for Cardiovascular Risk Assessment in Europe (BiomarCaRE) is an European collaborative research project with the primary objective to assess the value of established and emerging biomarkers for cardiovascular risk prediction. BiomarCaRE integrates clinical and epidemiological biomarker research and commercial enterprises throughout Europe to combine innovation in biomarker discovery for cardiovascular disease prediction with consecutive validation of biomarker effectiveness in large, well-defined primary and secondary prevention cohorts including over 300,000 participants from 13 European countries. Results from this study will contribute to improved cardiovascular risk prediction across different European populations. The present publication describes the rationale and design of the BiomarCaRE project.

TRANSVAC research infrastructure - Results and lessons learned from the European network of vaccine research and development.

PubMed

Geels, Mark J; Thøgersen, Regitze L; Guzman, Carlos A; Ho, Mei Mei; Verreck, Frank; Collin, Nicolas; Robertson, James S; McConkey, Samuel J; Kaufmann, Stefan H E; Leroy, Odile

2015-10-05

TRANSVAC was a collaborative infrastructure project aimed at enhancing European translational vaccine research and training. The objective of this four year project (2009-2013), funded under the European Commission's (EC) seventh framework programme (FP7), was to support European collaboration in the vaccine field, principally through the provision of transnational access (TNA) to critical vaccine research and development (R&D) infrastructures, as well as by improving and harmonising the services provided by these infrastructures through joint research activities (JRA). The project successfully provided all available services to advance 29 projects and, through engaging all vaccine stakeholders, successfully laid down the blueprint for the implementation of a permanent research infrastructure for early vaccine R&D in Europe. Copyright © 2015. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Preparation and Delivery of Protein Microcrystals in Lipidic Cubic Phase for Serial Femtosecond Crystallography.

PubMed

Ishchenko, Andrii; Cherezov, Vadim; Liu, Wei

2016-09-20

Membrane proteins (MPs) are essential components of cellular membranes and primary drug targets. Rational drug design relies on precise structural information, typically obtained by crystallography; however MPs are difficult to crystallize. Recent progress in MP structural determination has benefited greatly from the development of lipidic cubic phase (LCP) crystallization methods, which typically yield well-diffracting, but often small crystals that suffer from radiation damage during traditional crystallographic data collection at synchrotron sources. The development of new-generation X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) sources that produce extremely bright femtosecond pulses has enabled room temperature data collection from microcrystals with no or negligible radiation damage. Our recent efforts in combining LCP technology with serial femtosecond crystallography (LCP-SFX) have resulted in high-resolution structures of several human G protein-coupled receptors, which represent a notoriously difficult target for structure determination. In the LCP-SFX technique, LCP is recruited as a matrix for both growth and delivery of MP microcrystals to the intersection of the injector stream with an XFEL beam for crystallographic data collection. It has been demonstrated that LCP-SFX can substantially improve the diffraction resolution when only sub-10 µm crystals are available, or when the use of smaller crystals at room temperature can overcome various problems associated with larger cryocooled crystals, such as accumulation of defects, high mosaicity and cryocooling artifacts. Future advancements in X-ray sources and detector technologies should make serial crystallography highly attractive and practicable for implementation not only at XFELs, but also at more accessible synchrotron beamlines. Here we present detailed visual protocols for the preparation, characterization and delivery of microcrystals in LCP for serial crystallography experiments. These protocols include methods for conducting crystallization experiments in syringes, detecting and characterizing the crystal samples, optimizing crystal density, loading microcrystal laden LCP into the injector device and delivering the sample to the beam for data collection.

A high-transparency, micro-patternable chip for X-ray diffraction analysis of microcrystals under native growth conditions

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Murray, Thomas D.; Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD 21205; Lyubimov, Artem Y.

A highly X-ray-transparent, silicon nitride-based device has been designed and fabricated to harvest protein microcrystals for high-resolution X-ray diffraction data collection using microfocus beamlines and XFELs. Microcrystals present a significant impediment to the determination of macromolecular structures by X-ray diffraction methods. Although microfocus synchrotron beamlines and X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) can enable the collection of interpretable diffraction data from microcrystals, there is a need for efficient methods of harvesting small volumes (<2 µl) of microcrystals grown under common laboratory formats and delivering them to an X-ray beam source under native growth conditions. One approach that shows promise in overcoming themore » challenges intrinsic to microcrystal analysis is to pair so-called ‘fixed-target’ sample-delivery devices with microbeam-based X-ray diffraction methods. However, to record weak diffraction patterns it is necessary to fabricate devices from X-ray-transparent materials that minimize background scattering. Presented here is the design of a new micro-diffraction device consisting of three layers fabricated from silicon nitride, photoresist and polyimide film. The chip features low X-ray scattering and X-ray absorption properties, and uses a customizable blend of hydrophobic and hydrophilic surface patterns to help localize microcrystals to defined regions. Microcrystals in their native growth conditions can be loaded into the chips with a standard pipette, allowing data collection at room temperature. Diffraction data collected from hen egg-white lysozyme microcrystals (10–15 µm) loaded into the chips yielded a complete, high-resolution (<1.6 Å) data set sufficient to determine a high-quality structure by molecular replacement. The features of the chip allow the rapid and user-friendly analysis of microcrystals grown under virtually any laboratory format at microfocus synchrotron beamlines and XFELs.« less

The Ozone Project. Secondary Education.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Saugier, Philippe

This document describes the development of theme-based projects within a European co-operative environmental education framework at the secondary school level. The participation of 15 students from 9 different European countries in one such project is described. Students are involved with the publication of articles based on firsthand observations…

WavePropaGator: interactive framework for X-ray free-electron laser optics design and simulations.

PubMed

Samoylova, Liubov; Buzmakov, Alexey; Chubar, Oleg; Sinn, Harald

2016-08-01

This article describes the WavePropaGator ( WPG ) package, a new interactive software framework for coherent and partially coherent X-ray wavefront propagation simulations. The package has been developed at European XFEL for users at the existing and emerging free-electron laser (FEL) facilities, as well as at the third-generation synchrotron sources and future diffraction-limited storage rings. The WPG addresses the needs of beamline scientists and user groups to facilitate the design, optimization and improvement of X-ray optics to meet their experimental requirements. The package uses the Synchrotron Radiation Workshop ( SRW ) C/C++ library and its Python binding for numerical wavefront propagation simulations. The framework runs reliably under Linux, Microsoft Windows 7 and Apple Mac OS X and is distributed under an open-source license. The available tools allow for varying source parameters and optics layouts and visualizing the results interactively. The wavefront history structure can be used for tracking changes in every particular wavefront during propagation. The batch propagation mode enables processing of multiple wavefronts in workflow mode. The paper presents a general description of the package and gives some recent application examples, including modeling of full X-ray FEL beamlines and start-to-end simulation of experiments.

Ultra-high-resolution inelastic X-ray scattering at high-repetition-rate self-seeded X-ray free-electron lasers

PubMed Central

Chubar, Oleg; Geloni, Gianluca; Kocharyan, Vitali; Madsen, Anders; Saldin, Evgeni; Serkez, Svitozar; Shvyd’ko, Yuri; Sutter, John

2016-01-01

Inelastic X-ray scattering (IXS) is an important tool for studies of equilibrium dynamics in condensed matter. A new spectrometer recently proposed for ultra-high-resolution IXS (UHRIX) has achieved 0.6 meV and 0.25 nm−1 spectral and momentum-transfer resolutions, respectively. However, further improvements down to 0.1 meV and 0.02 nm−1 are required to close the gap in energy–momentum space between high- and low-frequency probes. It is shown that this goal can be achieved by further optimizing the X-ray optics and by increasing the spectral flux of the incident X-ray pulses. UHRIX performs best at energies from 5 to 10 keV, where a combination of self-seeding and undulator tapering at the SASE-2 beamline of the European XFEL promises up to a 100-fold increase in average spectral flux compared with nominal SASE pulses at saturation, or three orders of magnitude more than what is possible with storage-ring-based radiation sources. Wave-optics calculations show that about 7 × 1012 photons s−1 in a 90 µeV bandwidth can be achieved on the sample. This will provide unique new possibilities for dynamics studies by IXS. PMID:26917127

Linearization of the longitudinal phase space without higher harmonic field

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zeitler, Benno; Floettmann, Klaus; Grüner, Florian

2015-12-01

Accelerator applications like free-electron lasers, time-resolved electron diffraction, and advanced accelerator concepts like plasma acceleration desire bunches of ever shorter longitudinal extent. However, apart from space charge repulsion, the internal bunch structure and its development along the beam line can limit the achievable compression due to nonlinear phase space correlations. In order to improve such a limited longitudinal focus, a correction by properly linearizing the phase space is required. At large scale facilities like Flash at Desy or the European Xfel, a higher harmonic cavity is installed for this purpose. In this paper, another method is described and evaluated: Expanding the beam after the electron source enables a higher order correction of the longitudinal focus by a subsequent accelerating cavity which is operated at the same frequency as the electron gun. The elaboration of this idea presented here is based on a ballistic bunching scheme, but can be extended to bunch compression based on magnetic chicanes. The core of this article is an analytic model describing this approach, which is verified by simulations, predicting possible bunch length below 1 fs at low bunch charge. Minimizing the energy spread down to σE/E <1 0-5 while keeping the bunch long is another interesting possibility, which finds applications, e.g., in time resolved transmission electron microscopy concepts.

Optimization of cathodic arc deposition and pulsed plasma melting techniques for growing smooth superconducting Pb photoemissive films for SRF injectors

DOE PAGES

Nietubyc, Robert; Lorkiewicz, Jerzy; Sekutowicz, Jacek; ...

2018-02-14

Superconducting photoinjectors have a potential to be the optimal solution for moderate and high current cw operating free electron lasers. For this application, a superconducting lead (Pb) cathode has been proposed to simplify the cathode integration into a 1.3 GHz, TESLA-type, 1.6-cell long purely superconducting gun cavity. In the proposed design, a lead film several micrometres thick is deposited onto a niobium plug attached to the cavity back wall. Traditional lead deposition techniques usually produce very non-uniform emission surfaces and often result in a poor adhesion of the layer. A pulsed plasma melting procedure reducing the non-uniformity of the leadmore » photocathodes is presented. In order to determine the parameters optimal for this procedure, heat transfer from plasma to the film was first modelled to evaluate melting front penetration range and liquid state duration. The obtained results were verified by surface inspection of witness samples. The optimal procedure was used to prepare a photocathode plug, which was then tested in an electron gun. In conclusion, the quantum efficiency and the value of cavity quality factor have been found to satisfy the requirements for an injector of the European-XFEL facility.« less

Optimization of cathodic arc deposition and pulsed plasma melting techniques for growing smooth superconducting Pb photoemissive films for SRF injectors

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Nietubyc, Robert; Lorkiewicz, Jerzy; Sekutowicz, Jacek

Superconducting photoinjectors have a potential to be the optimal solution for moderate and high current cw operating free electron lasers. For this application, a superconducting lead (Pb) cathode has been proposed to simplify the cathode integration into a 1.3 GHz, TESLA-type, 1.6-cell long purely superconducting gun cavity. In the proposed design, a lead film several micrometres thick is deposited onto a niobium plug attached to the cavity back wall. Traditional lead deposition techniques usually produce very non-uniform emission surfaces and often result in a poor adhesion of the layer. A pulsed plasma melting procedure reducing the non-uniformity of the leadmore » photocathodes is presented. In order to determine the parameters optimal for this procedure, heat transfer from plasma to the film was first modelled to evaluate melting front penetration range and liquid state duration. The obtained results were verified by surface inspection of witness samples. The optimal procedure was used to prepare a photocathode plug, which was then tested in an electron gun. In conclusion, the quantum efficiency and the value of cavity quality factor have been found to satisfy the requirements for an injector of the European-XFEL facility.« less

Ultra-high-resolution inelastic X-ray scattering at high-repetition-rate self-seeded X-ray free-electron lasers

DOE PAGES

Chubar, Oleg; Geloni, Gianluca; Kocharyan, Vitali; ...

2016-03-01

Inelastic X-ray scattering (IXS) is an important tool for studies of equilibrium dynamics in condensed matter. A new spectrometer recently proposed for ultra-high-resolution IXS (UHRIX) has achieved 0.6 meV and 0.25 nm ₋1spectral and momentum-transfer resolutions, respectively. However, further improvements down to 0.1 meV and 0.02 nm ₋1are required to close the gap in energy–momentum space between high- and low-frequency probes. It is shown that this goal can be achieved by further optimizing the X-ray optics and by increasing the spectral flux of the incident X-ray pulses. UHRIX performs best at energies from 5 to 10 keV, where a combinationmore » of self-seeding and undulator tapering at the SASE-2 beamline of the European XFEL promises up to a 100-fold increase in average spectral flux compared with nominal SASE pulses at saturation, or three orders of magnitude more than what is possible with storage-ring-based radiation sources. Wave-optics calculations show that about 7 × 10 12 photons s ₋1in a 90 µeV bandwidth can be achieved on the sample. Ultimately, this will provide unique new possibilities for dynamics studies by IXS.« less

Accelerator science and technology in Europe 2008-2017

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Romaniuk, Ryszard S.

2013-10-01

European Framework Research Projects have recently added a lot of meaning to the building process of the ERA - the European Research Area. Inside this, the accelerator technology plays an essential role. Accelerator technology includes large infrastructure and intelligent, modern instrumentation embracing mechatronics, electronics, photonics and ICT. During the realization of the European research and infrastructure project FP6 CARE 2004-2008 (Coordinated Accelerator Research in Europe), concerning the development of large accelerator infrastructure in Europe, it was decided that a scientific editorial series of peer-reviewed monographs from this research area will be published in close relation with the projects. It was a completely new and quite brave idea to combine a kind of a strictly research publisher with a transient project, lasting only four or five years. Till then nobody did something like that. The idea turned out to be a real success. The publications now known and valued in the accelerator world, as the (CERN-WUT) Editorial Series on Accelerator Science and Technology, is successfully continued in already the third European project EuCARD2 and has logistic guarantees, for the moment, till the 2017, when it will mature to its first decade. During the realization of the European projects EuCARD (European Coordination for Accelerator R&D 2009-2013 and TIARA (Test Infrastructure of Accelerator Research Area in Europe) there were published 18 volumes in this series. The ambitious plans for the nearest years is to publish, hopefully, a few tens of new volumes. Accelerator science and technology is one of a key enablers of the developments in the particle physic, photon physics and also applications in medicine and industry. The paper presents a digest of the research results in the domain of accelerator science and technology in Europe, published in the monographs of the European Framework Projects (FP) on accelerator technology. The succession of CARE, EuCARD and EuCARD Projects is evidently creating a new quality in the European Accelerator Research. It is consolidating the technical and research communities in a new way, completely different than the traditional ones, for example via the periodic topical conferences.

Interest high in EEC technology grants

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Not Available

1981-06-01

There has been high interest shown by oil companies and industrialists in the seventh round grants for hydrocarbon technology projects funded by the European Economic Community (EEC). So far, the EEC has obtained 63 applications for projects costing 668 million European units of account. A listing of the 1980 projects describes concepts, company, and country; EEC contributions; and a brief sketch of project objectives.

The European Project Semester at ISEP: The Challenge of Educating Global Engineers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Malheiro, Benedita; Silva, Manuel; Ribeiro, Maria Cristina; Guedes, Pedro; Ferreira, Paulo

2015-01-01

Current engineering education challenges require approaches that promote scientific, technical, design and complementary skills while fostering autonomy, innovation and responsibility. The European Project Semester (EPS) at Instituto Superior de Engenharia do Porto (ISEP) (EPS@ISEP) is a one semester project-based learning programme (30 European…

Developing a European Practitioner Qualification: The TRAVORS2 Project

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lester, Stan

2013-01-01

The TRAVORS projects, supported by the European Union's Lifelong Learning Programme, ran between 2008 and 2012. Their object was to develop training programmes for disability employment practitioners across nine countries based on proven approaches both to vocational rehabilitation and to skills training. The second of the two projects aimed to…

SkWwatch: Introducing European Youth to the World of Scientific Research through Interactive Utilisation of a Global Network of Robotic Telescopes

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sotiriou, M.; Vrazopoulos, H.; Ioannou, P.; Sotiriou, S.; Vagenas, E.

2005-12-01

The SkyWatch project is co-fi nanced by the European Community, within the FP6 framework of Science and Society, The SkyWatch consortium is composed by the following partners: Q-PLAN (GR), EDEN - Open Classroom (UK), Astrophysics Research Institute - Liverpool John Moores University (UK), European Physical Society (FR), Ellinogermaniki Agogi (GR), Stockholm University (SE), SCIENCE PROJECTS (UK) and University of Duisburg-Essen (DE). The aim of the SkyWatch project is to build up the number of youngsters involved in a series of science projects to create a virtual community of prospective young researchers promoting scientifi c culture. The project will allow young people to access and use robotic telescopes remotely in real-time, perform observations, analyze data and results and fi nally to develop and suggest solutions to selected research/scientifi c topics, all achieved through an innovative web-based learning environment. The dissemination of the project's activities is also served by a European Science Contest on science topics and projects, a series of popular science distance learning courses (Science Days) for European youth, promotion of concepts and ideas of science of a multidisciplinary nature: astronomy, physics, mathematics, chemistry, etc. The young participants are prompted to organize teams (school classes, groups of students, etc.) and to design, develop and implement projects and activities with the use of robotic telescopes under the guidance and the continuous support of a team of experts.

Tracking uptake of innovations from the European Union Public Health Programme.

PubMed

Voss, Margaretha; Alexanderson, Kristina; McCarthy, Mark

2013-11-01

The European Commission developed the Public Health Programme to enable cross-national innovation and transfer in fields of health information, health threats and health promotion. PHIRE (Public Health Innovation and Research in Europe), a collaboration of the European Public Health Association (EUPHA) with seven partners, addressed the uptake of these public health innovation projects at country level. EUPHA thematic sections lead on areas of public health practice and research and experts can choose to be section members. The section presidents of seven sections chose eight European public health projects, starting in the EU Public Health Programme in 2003-05, that provided new knowledge for practice and covered a majority of the EU countries. A web-based questionnaire recorded country informants' (CIs) perceptions of uptake, assessed as relevance and dissemination to a range of public and non-governmental organizations. 108 CIs individually described the eight innovations in an average of 14 (46%) of the 30 European countries. Three of the eight innovations were considered of high relevance by >60% of respondents and at least 70% of informants considered seven of the eight innovation projects as of high or moderate relevance. Dissemination was noted across governmental, professional and academic settings, with high impact on knowledge/awareness for at least 30% of CIs. Some projects had uptake within the policy cycle in particular countries and connected strongly with academics and professionals. Projects working at local level had less visibility nationally and some projects were unknown to national respondents. European Union funding for public health can contribute to cross-national knowledge transfer and uptake of innovations. More attention is needed to classify, characterize and identify public health innovations and to demonstrate their direct contribution to European health and well-being.

Gaiaverse: the Gaia's outreach portal

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Masana, E.

2017-03-01

Gaiaverse (http://gaiaverse.eu) is a dissemination portal on the ESA Gaia's mission developed within the GENIUS project, an European project funded by the European Commission to boost the impact of the next European breakthrough in astrophysics, the Gaia astrometric mission. The portal was opened in July 2015. Gaiaverse is administrated by the Universitat de Barcelona (UB) and the Consorci de Serveis Universitaris de Catalunya (CSUC).

Education: Guide to European Organizations and Programmes. A Guide to European Organizations Involved in Education, including Individual Programmes and Projects.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hayes, Heledd

This report presents a guide to European organizations involved in education, including individual programs and projects. Entries are brief as they are intended as simple outlines of the organizations or programs, but full addresses and telephone numbers are provided. Divided into four categories, the organizations listed are as follows: (1)…

Teacher Quality, Professionalism and Professional Development: Findings from a European Project

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hilton, Gillian; Flores, Maria Assunção; Niklasson, Laila

2013-01-01

This paper presents and discusses findings from a European project concerning strengthening the teacher's voice in defining professional quality. In the project tools were developed and evaluated to help teachers reflect on their professional quality. Twelve countries participated and twelve tools were tested with help of student teachers,…

STENCIL: Science Teaching European Network for Creativity and Innovation in Learning

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Cattadori, M.; Magrefi, F.

2013-12-01

STENCIL is an european educational project funded with support of the European Commission within the framework of LLP7 (Lifelong Learning Programme) for a period of 3 years (2011 - 2013). STENCIL includes 21 members from 9 European countries (Bulgaria, Germany, Greece, France, Italy, Malta, Portugal, Slovenia, Turkey.) working together to contribute to the general objective of improving science teaching, by promoting innovative methodologies and creative solutions. Among the innovative methods adept a particolar interest is a joint partnership between a wide spectrum of type of institutions such as schools, school authorities, research centres, universities, science museums, and other organizations, representing differing perspectives on science education. STENCIL offers to practitioners in science education from all over Europe, a platform; the web portal - www.stencil-science.eu - that provides high visibility to schools and institutions involved in Comenius and other similar European funded projects in science education. STENCIL takes advantage of the positive results achieved by the former European projects STELLA - Science Teaching in a Lifelong Learning Approach (2007 - 2009) and GRID - Growing interest in the development of teaching science (2004-2006). The specific objectives of the project are : 1) to identify and promote innovative practices in science teaching through the publication of Annual Reports on Science Education; 2) to bring together science education practitioners to share different experiences and learn from each other through the organisation of periodical study visits and workshops; 3) to disseminate materials and outcomes coming from previous EU funded projects and from isolated science education initiatives through the STENCIL web portal, as well as through international conferences and national events. This contribution aims at explaining the main features of the project together with the achieved results during the project's 3 year lifetime-span.

The ECO European Project: A New MOOC Dimension Based on an Intercreativity Environment

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Acedo, Sara Osuna; Cano, Lucía Camarero

2016-01-01

The ECO European Project funded by the European Commission is dedicated to bringing MOOCs to a new dimension by taking advantage of the new possibilities offered by the Social Web (O'Reilly, 2005). This paper focuses on the intercreative aspects of MOOCs. It takes a look at the characteristics of the new ECO MOOCs to see if they are designed and…

3D Geological modelling - towards a European level infrastructure

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lee, Kathryn A.; van der Krogt, Rob; Busschers, Freek S.

2013-04-01

The joint European Geological Surveys are preparing the ground for a "European Geological Data Infrastructure" (EGDI), under the framework of the FP7-project EGDI-Scope. This scoping study, started in June 2012, for a pan-European e-Infrastructure is based on the successes of earlier joint projects including 'OneGeology-Europe' and aims to provide the backbone for serving interoperable, geological data currently held by European Geological Surveys. Also data from past, ongoing and future European projects will be incorporated. The scope will include an investigation of the functional and technical requirements for serving 3D geological models and will look to research the potential for providing a framework to integrate models at different scales, and form a structure for enabling the development of new and innovative model delivery mechanisms. The EGDI-scope project encourages pan-European inter-disciplinary collaboration between all European Geological Surveys. It aims to enhance emerging web based technologies that will facilitate the delivery of geological data to user communities involved in European policy making and international industry, but also to geoscientific research communities and the general public. Therefore, stakeholder input and communication is imperative to the success, as is the collaboration with all the Geological Surveys of Europe. The most important functional and technical requirements for delivery of such information at pan-European level will be derived from exchanges with relevant European stakeholder representatives and providers of geological data. For handling and delivering 3D geological model data the project will need to address a number of strategic issues: • Which are the most important issues and queries for the relevant stakeholders, requiring 3D geological models? How can this be translated to functional requirements for development and design of an integrated European application? • How to handle the very large differences in quality and scales with regard to 3D geological modelling in different European countries and regions, within a harmonized European framework? • How to handle the differences in model concepts and perceptions, especially with regard to the leading developers of 3D geological models within Europe? • How to handle differences between participating countries concerning relevant legal issues, governance, and funding models? With a primary focus on these issues, the EGDI-Scope study will provide a number of possible scenarios for delivery of 3D geological models and information within an integrated European application, including the most relevant technical, legal and organizational consequences.

The ELISE II Project: A Digital Image Library for Europe.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Strunz, Bob; Waters, Mairead

This paper describes the progress made under the ELISE II electronic image library project from a technical standpoint. The ELISE II project is a European-wide initiative that aims to provide a comprehensive electronic image library service for Europe. It is funded under the European Commission, DG XIII-E, Telematics for Libraries Initiative. The…

Inclusion through Access to Outdoor Education: Learning in Motion (LIM)

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Brodin, Jane

2009-01-01

Learning in Motion (LIM) was a European project involving seven partners in five countries: Sweden, Finland, Latvia, Germany and Greece. The project focused on inclusion and access to outdoor education and was financed by the European Commission within the framework of the Socrates-Grundtvig Programme. The aim of the project was to explore if and…

Report on the EMBER Project--A European Multimedia Bioinformatics Educational Resource

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Attwood, Terri K.; Selimas, Ioannis; Buis, Rob; Altenburg, Ruud; Herzog, Robert; Ledent, Valerie; Ghita, Viorica; Fernandes, Pedro; Marques, Isabel; Brugman, Marc

2005-01-01

EMBER was a European project aiming to develop bioinformatics teaching materials on the Web and CD-ROM to help address the recognised skills shortage in bioinformatics. The project grew out of pilot work on the development of an interactive web-based bioinformatics tutorial and the desire to repackage that resource with the help of a professional…

Education for Sustainability in University Studies: Experiences from a Project Involving European and Latin American Universities

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Geli de Ciurana, Anna M.; Filho, Walter Leal

2006-01-01

Purpose: To report on a project involving European and Latin American universities, focusing on curriculum greening. Design/methodology/approach: This paper presents the experiences gained in connection with the "ACES Project" which is a model of the implementation of sustainability principles in higher education, with a special emphasis…

Life in the Universe? Is anybody out there?

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

2001-07-01

What is our understanding at the beginning of the 21st century? Is there any scientific evidence for other forms of life? How can you define life? What signs are we looking for? What would the reaction be if other forms of life were discovered? The European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), the European Space Agency and the European Southern Observatory, in cooperation with the European Association for Astronomy Education, have organised a competition to find out what young people in Europe think. The European Molecular Biology Laboratory and the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility are also involved. This "Life in the Universe" project is being mounted in collaboration with the research directorate of the European Commission for the European Week of Science and Technology in November this year. Competitions are already under way in 23 European countries to find the best projects from school students aged between 14 and 19. Entries can be in one of two categories: scientific or artistic. The projects can therefore be essays, newspapers, websites, artworks, poetry or even a theatrical or musical performance. Two winning teams (one in each category) from each country will be invited to a final event at CERN in Geneva on 8-11 November to present their projects to an international panel of experts at a special event devoting three days to enquiring into the possibility of other life forms existing in our Universe. This final event will be broadcast all over the world via the Internet. The home base of the "Life in the Universe" project is a vibrant website www.lifeinuniverse.org where details of the programme can be found. It is still under development but already has a wealth of information and links to the national websites, where all entries are posted. Is there other life in the Universe? We do not know - but the search is on!

Preparation of Microcrystals in Lipidic Cubic Phase for Serial Femtosecond Crystallography

PubMed Central

Liu, Wei; Ishchenko, Andrii; Cherezov, Vadim

2014-01-01

We have recently established a procedure for serial femtosecond crystallography in lipidic cubic phase (LCP-SFX) for protein structure determination at X-ray free electron lasers (XFELs). LCP-SFX uses the gel-like lipidic cubic phase (LCP) as a matrix for growth and delivery of membrane protein microcrystals for crystallographic data collection. LCP is a liquid-crystalline mesophase, composed of lipids and water. It provides a membrane-mimicking environment that stabilizes membrane proteins and supports their crystallization. Here we describe detailed procedures for the preparation and characterization of microcrystals for LCP-SFX applications. The advantages of LCP-SFX over traditional crystallographic methods include the capability of collecting room temperature high-resolution data with minimal effects of radiation damage from sub-10 µm crystals of membrane and soluble proteins that are difficult to crystallize, while eliminating the need for crystal harvesting and cryo-cooling. Compared to SFX methods for microcrystals in solution using liquid injectors, LCP-SFX reduces protein consumption by 2–3 orders of magnitude for data collection at currently available XFELs. The whole procedure typically takes 3–5 days, including the time required for crystals to grow. PMID:25122522

Ultrafast Dynamics of a Nucleobase Analogue Illuminated by a Short Intense X-ray Free Electron Laser Pulse

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Nagaya, K.; Motomura, K.; Kukk, E.

Understanding x-ray radiation damage is a crucial issue for both medical applications of x rays and x-ray free-electron-laser (XFEL) science aimed at molecular imaging. Decrypting the charge and fragmentation dynamics of nucleobases, the smallest units of a macro-biomolecule, contributes to a bottom-up understanding of the damage via cascades of phenomena following x-ray exposure. We investigate experimentally and by numerical simulations the ultrafast radiation damage induced on a nucleobase analogue (5-iodouracil) by an ultrashort (10 fs) high-intensity radiation pulse generated by XFEL at SPring-8 Angstrom Compact free electron Laser (SACLA). The present study elucidates a plausible underlying radiosensitizing mechanism of 5-iodouracil.more » This mechanism is independent of the exact composition of 5-iodouracil and thus relevant to other such radiosensitizers. Furthermore, we found that despite a rapid increase of the net molecular charge in the presence of iodine, and of the ultrafast release of hydrogen, the other atoms are almost frozen within the 10-fs duration of the exposure. Finally, this validates single-shot molecular imaging as a consistent approach, provided the radiation pulse used is brief enough.« less

Materials science in the time domain using Bragg coherent diffraction imaging

DOE PAGES

Robinson, Ian; Clark, Jesse; Harder, Ross

2016-03-14

Materials are generally classified by a phase diagram which displays their properties as a function of external state variables, typically temperature and pressure. A new dimension that is relatively unexplored is time: a rich variety of new materials can become accessible in the transient period following laser excitation from the ground state. The timescale of nanoseconds to femtoseconds, is ripe for investigation using x-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) methods. There is no shortage of materials suitable for time-resolved materials-science exploration. Oxides alone represent most of the minerals making up the Earth's crust, catalysts, ferroelectrics, corrosion products and electronically ordered materials suchmore » as superconductors, to name a few. Some of the elements have metastable phase diagrams with predicted new phases. There are some examples known already: an oxide 'hidden phase' living only nanoseconds and an electronically ordered excited phase of fullerene C 60, lasting only femtoseconds. In a completely general way, optically excited states of materials can be probed with Bragg coherent diffraction imaging, both below the damage threshold and in the destructive regime. Lastly, prospective methods for carrying out such XFEL experiments are discussed.« less

Ultrafast Dynamics of a Nucleobase Analogue Illuminated by a Short Intense X-ray Free Electron Laser Pulse

DOE PAGES

Nagaya, K.; Motomura, K.; Kukk, E.; ...

2016-06-16

Understanding x-ray radiation damage is a crucial issue for both medical applications of x rays and x-ray free-electron-laser (XFEL) science aimed at molecular imaging. Decrypting the charge and fragmentation dynamics of nucleobases, the smallest units of a macro-biomolecule, contributes to a bottom-up understanding of the damage via cascades of phenomena following x-ray exposure. We investigate experimentally and by numerical simulations the ultrafast radiation damage induced on a nucleobase analogue (5-iodouracil) by an ultrashort (10 fs) high-intensity radiation pulse generated by XFEL at SPring-8 Angstrom Compact free electron Laser (SACLA). The present study elucidates a plausible underlying radiosensitizing mechanism of 5-iodouracil.more » This mechanism is independent of the exact composition of 5-iodouracil and thus relevant to other such radiosensitizers. Furthermore, we found that despite a rapid increase of the net molecular charge in the presence of iodine, and of the ultrafast release of hydrogen, the other atoms are almost frozen within the 10-fs duration of the exposure. Finally, this validates single-shot molecular imaging as a consistent approach, provided the radiation pulse used is brief enough.« less

An Overview of the MaRIE X-FEL and Electron Radiography LINAC RF Systems

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Bradley, Joseph Thomas III; Rees, Daniel Earl; Scheinker, Alexander

The purpose of the Matter-Radiation Interactions in Extremes (MaRIE) facility at Los Alamos National Laboratory is to investigate the performance limits of materials in extreme environments. The MaRIE facility will utilize a 12 GeV linac to drive an X-ray Free-Electron Laser (FEL). Most of the same linac will also be used to perform electron radiography. The main linac is driven by two shorter linacs; one short linac optimized for X-FEL pulses and one for electron radiography. The RF systems have historically been the one of the largest single component costs of a linac. We will describe the details of themore » different types of RF systems required by each part of the linacs. Starting with the High Power RF system, we will present our methodology for the choice of RF system peak power and pulselength with respect to klystron parameters, modulator parameters, performance requirements and relative costs. We will also present an overview of the Low Level RF systems that are proposed for MaRIE and briefly describe their use with some proposed control schemes.« less

Specimen preparation for cryogenic coherent X-ray diffraction imaging of biological cells and cellular organelles by using the X-ray free-electron laser at SACLA

PubMed Central

Kobayashi, Amane; Sekiguchi, Yuki; Oroguchi, Tomotaka; Okajima, Koji; Fukuda, Asahi; Oide, Mao; Yamamoto, Masaki; Nakasako, Masayoshi

2016-01-01

Coherent X-ray diffraction imaging (CXDI) allows internal structures of biological cells and cellular organelles to be analyzed. CXDI experiments have been conducted at 66 K for frozen-hydrated biological specimens at the SPring-8 Angstrom Compact Free-Electron Laser facility (SACLA). In these cryogenic CXDI experiments using X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) pulses, specimen particles dispersed on thin membranes of specimen disks are transferred into the vacuum chamber of a diffraction apparatus. Because focused single XFEL pulses destroy specimen particles at the atomic level, diffraction patterns are collected through raster scanning the specimen disks to provide fresh specimen particles in the irradiation area. The efficiency of diffraction data collection in cryogenic experiments depends on the quality of the prepared specimens. Here, detailed procedures for preparing frozen-hydrated biological specimens, particularly thin membranes and devices developed in our laboratory, are reported. In addition, the quality of the frozen-hydrated specimens are evaluated by analyzing the characteristics of the collected diffraction patterns. Based on the experimental results, the internal structures of the frozen-hydrated specimens and the future development for efficient diffraction data collection are discussed. PMID:27359147

Specimen preparation for cryogenic coherent X-ray diffraction imaging of biological cells and cellular organelles by using the X-ray free-electron laser at SACLA.

PubMed

Kobayashi, Amane; Sekiguchi, Yuki; Oroguchi, Tomotaka; Okajima, Koji; Fukuda, Asahi; Oide, Mao; Yamamoto, Masaki; Nakasako, Masayoshi

2016-07-01

Coherent X-ray diffraction imaging (CXDI) allows internal structures of biological cells and cellular organelles to be analyzed. CXDI experiments have been conducted at 66 K for frozen-hydrated biological specimens at the SPring-8 Angstrom Compact Free-Electron Laser facility (SACLA). In these cryogenic CXDI experiments using X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) pulses, specimen particles dispersed on thin membranes of specimen disks are transferred into the vacuum chamber of a diffraction apparatus. Because focused single XFEL pulses destroy specimen particles at the atomic level, diffraction patterns are collected through raster scanning the specimen disks to provide fresh specimen particles in the irradiation area. The efficiency of diffraction data collection in cryogenic experiments depends on the quality of the prepared specimens. Here, detailed procedures for preparing frozen-hydrated biological specimens, particularly thin membranes and devices developed in our laboratory, are reported. In addition, the quality of the frozen-hydrated specimens are evaluated by analyzing the characteristics of the collected diffraction patterns. Based on the experimental results, the internal structures of the frozen-hydrated specimens and the future development for efficient diffraction data collection are discussed.

Transmission electron microscopy as a tool for nanocrystal characterization pre- and post-injector

PubMed Central

Stevenson, H. P.; DePonte, D. P.; Makhov, A. M.; Conway, James F.; Zeldin, O. B.; Boutet, S.; Calero, G.; Cohen, A. E.

2014-01-01

Recent advancements at the Linac Coherent Light Source X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) enabling successful serial femtosecond diffraction experiments using nanometre-sized crystals (NCs) have opened up the possibility of X-ray structure determination of proteins that produce only submicrometre crystals such as many membrane proteins. Careful crystal pre-characterization including compatibility testing of the sample delivery method is essential to ensure efficient use of the limited beamtime available at XFEL sources. This work demonstrates the utility of transmission electron microscopy for detecting and evaluating NCs within the carrier solutions of liquid injectors. The diffraction quality of these crystals may be assessed by examining the crystal lattice and by calculating the fast Fourier transform of the image. Injector reservoir solutions, as well as solutions collected post-injection, were evaluated for three types of protein NCs (i) the membrane protein PTHR1, (ii) the multi-protein complex Pol II-GFP and (iii) the soluble protein lysozyme. Our results indicate that the concentration and diffraction quality of NCs, particularly those with high solvent content and sensitivity to mechanical manipulation may be affected by the delivery process. PMID:24914151

Working towards a European Geological Data Infrastructure

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

van der Krogt, Rob; Hughes, Richard; Pedersen, Mikael; Serrano, Jean-Jacques; Lee, Kathryn A.; Tulstrup, Jørgen; Robida, François

2013-04-01

The increasing importance of geological information for policy, regulation and business needs at European and international level has been recognized by the European Parliament and the European Commission, who have called for the development of a common European geological knowledge base. The societal relevance of geoscience data/information is clear from many current issues such as shale gas exploration (including environmental impacts), the availability of critical mineral resources in a global economy, management and security with regard to geohazards (seismic, droughts, floods, ground stability), quality of (ground-)water and soil and societal responses to the impacts of climate change. The EGDI-Scope project responds to this, aiming to prepare an implementation plan for a pan-European Geological Data Infrastructure (EGDI), under the umbrella of the FP7 e- Infrastructures program. It is envisaged that the EGDI will build on geological datasets and models currently held by the European Geological Surveys at national and regional levels, and will also provide a platform for datasets generated by the large number of relevant past, ongoing and future European projects which have geological components. With European policy makers and decision makers from (international) industry as the main target groups (followed by research communities and the general public) stakeholder involvement is imperative to the successful realization and continuity of the EGDI. With these ambitions in mind, the presentation will focus on the following issues, also based on the first results and experiences of the EGDI-Scope project that started mid-2012: • The organization of stakeholder input and commitment connected to relevant 'use cases' within different thematic domains; a number of stakeholder representatives is currently involved, but the project is open to more extensive participation; • A large number of European projects relevant for data delivery to EGDI has been reviewed; what can we conclude and what is the way forward? • The project has evaluated relevant existing interoperable infrastructures revealing a typology of infrastructures that may be useful models for the EGDI; • Planning for the EGDI also need to be integrated with other relevant international initiatives and programs such as GMES, GEO and EPOS, and with legally binding regulations like INSPIRE. The outcomes of these relevant evaluations and activities will contribute to the implementation plan for the EGDI including the prioritization of relevant datasets and the most important functional, technical (design, use of standards), legal and organizational requirements.

Erasmus+: Capacity Building in Higher Education. EU Support to Higher Education Institutions around the World

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Jongsma, Ard

2016-01-01

The aim of this brochure is to introduce those who are new to working with European Union funding, to the philosophy of Erasmus+ "capacity-building in higher education" projects. European Union experience of working on these types of projects will be shared. Examples of existing projects are scattered throughout the text to inspire you…

Geography, Economic Education and Global Education: European and Austrian Aspects of the "Fifobi--Developing Business Competencies in School" Project

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Schwarz, Ingrid

2012-01-01

Purpose: The EU-funded research project "Fifobi--Fit for Business--developing business competencies in school" (2009-2012) focused on the implementation of economic education in seven European countries. The purpose of the project and this paper is to investigate the current programmes that exist within the final two years of compulsory…

Putting culture in the curriculum: a European project.

PubMed

Sairanen, Raija; Richardson, Eileen; Kelly, Hélène; Bergknut, Eva; Koskinen, Liisa; Lundberg, Pranee; Muir, Nita; Olt, Helen; De Vlieger, Lily

2013-03-01

The purpose of this paper is to describe the rationale for and the method of designing a framework for a European curriculum to promote intercultural competence in health care students. The background relating to the migration of people into and across Europe is cited as the factor driving the need for such a project. The project group emerged from the European organisation known as COHEHRE (Consortium of Higher Education Institutes in Health and Rehabilitation in Europe). Composed of a group of nurse educators from 5 European countries it charts the process which led them to create a curriculum framework. The completed work is available in the form of a CD-ROM. The paper describes the steps taken to reach the project outcomes over 4 years. The methods of dissemination of the project outcomes are included. The discussion considers the journey of the group towards the outcomes of the project and identifies the need to discover how effective the framework is in achieving the aims of the group. In conclusion it articulates the hope that this work will improve the care which is shown to all recipients of health care whatever their cultural background. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Active Aging and Elderly's Quality of Life: Comparing the Impact on Literature of Projects Funded by the European Union and USA.

PubMed

Kirilov, I; Atzeni, M; Perra, A; Moro, D; Carta, M G

2018-01-01

The objective of this research is to verify whether European projects on Active Aging (AA) and Elderly Quality of Life (Qol) funded by the Seventh Framework Programme (FP7) produce an impact on literature similar to projects funded by the National Health Institute (NHI) of the United States on international literature using well-known bibliometric indicators. This effort may be useful in developing standardized and replicable procedures. Fifteen randomly selected projects on AA and Elderly Qol concluded in August 2017 and funded by FP7 were compared to similar projects funded by the US NHI with reference to papers published (Scopus and Scholar), papers published in Q1 journals, and the number of citations of the papers linked to the projects. In all the indicators considered, the European projects showed no difference with the US NHI projects. The EU-funded AA and Qol Elderly projects have an impact on scientific literature comparable to projects funded in the United States by the NHI Agency.Our results are consistent with the data on general medical research, which indicates that, European research remains at a high level of competitiveness.In this experimental study, our methodology appeared to be convincing and reliable and it could be applied to the extent of the impact of more extensive research areas.Our research did not evaluate the relationship between funding required by research and scientific productivity.

Support for EU fundraising in the field of Environment & Energy - BayFOR

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ammerl, Thomas; Baumann, Cornelia; Reiter, Andrea; Blume, Andreas; Just, Jana; Franke, Jan

2013-04-01

The Bavarian Research Alliance (BayFOR, http://www.bayfor.org) is a private company for the support of Bavaria (Free State in the South East of Germany) as a centre for science and innovation within the European Research Area. It was set up on the initiative of the Bavarian universities to strengthen their networking at regional, national and international level while helping them to prepare to meet the requirements for European research funding. The focus is directed at the current EU Framework Programme (FP7) and the forthcoming Framework Programme for Research and Innovation "Horizon 2020", but also comprises the wide range of European programmes (e.g. FP7, LIFE+, Interreg, COST, EUREKA, ERA-Nets, IEE (CIP), LLP, Calls for tender). BayFOR is also a partner institution in the Bavarian "Haus der Forschung" (www.hausderforschung.bayern.de/en). BayFORs overall aim is to strengthen and permanently anchor the science and innovation location of Bavaria in the European Research Area through: a) Initiation of national and in particular European innovation and science partnerships from academia and business b) Improvement of innovation potential of Bavarian universities and SME c) Support in acquisition, management and dissemination of results of European and international projects in the field of research and technological development The service portfolio of the EU Funding Advisory Service reaches from the first project idea to project implementation. The minimum condition for BayFOR support is at least one partner from Bavaria (Germany) must be part of the applying consortium: a) Recommendation of funding programmes/instruments (incl. integration of relevant EU policies & directives) b) Partner search c) Project development and proposal elaboration (Online platform, Creation of consortium, Attendance at meetings, Preparation of documents, Proposal structure elaboration, Provision of templates, Editorial support: Gantt, PERT, Impact, EU added value) d) Support in the Contract negotiations with the European Commission e) Project implementation (Project management, dissemination, Science-Policy-Interface) BayFOR staff has profound R&D background, as well as knowledge and experience in disseminating project outcomes, in particular with regard to the adaptation of results to the needs of relevant target groups like science, industry/SMEs, policy makers and the public. Furthermore, BayFOR can draw on distinct experience in the management of European research projects (e.g. CLIMB, Largecells, AlpBC, GeoMol, WE-EEN, WINALP). As a partner in the network for SMEs "Enterprise Europe Network" (EEN), BayFOR offers advice and support on topics such as funding, research programs, public procurement, market penetration and the promotion of innovation at European level. Beyond, BayFOR will make use of its regional networks to promote uptake and exploitation of project results. BayFOR is also commissioned by Bavaria's State Ministry of Science, Research and the Arts to look after the Bavarian University Funding Programme for the Initiation of International Projects (BayIntAn). Our efforts are aimed at initiating or strengthening transnational collaborative research involving Bavarian universities and universities of applied sciences.

DIAS Project: The establishment of a European digital upper atmosphere server

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Belehaki, A.; Cander, Lj.; Zolesi, B.; Bremer, J.; Juren, C.; Stanislawska, I.; Dialetis, D.; Hatzopoulos, M.

2005-08-01

The main objective of DIAS (European Digital Upper Atmosphere Server) project is to develop a pan-European digital data collection on the state of the upper atmosphere, based on real-time information and historical data collections provided by most operating ionospheric stations in Europe. A DIAS system will distribute information required by various groups of users for the specification of upper atmospheric conditions over Europe suitable for nowcasting and forecasting purposes. The successful operation of the DIAS system will lead to the development of new European added-value products and services, to the effective use of observational data in operational applications and consequently to the expansion of the relevant European market.

Cryopreservation and conservation of microalgae: the development of a Pan-European scientific and biotechnological resource (the COBRA project).

PubMed

Day, J G; Benson, E E; Harding, K; Knowles, B; Idowu, M; Bremner, D; Santos, L; Santos, F; Friedl, T; Lorenz, M; Lukesova, A; Elster, J; Lukavsky, J; Herdman, M; Rippka, R; Hall, T

2005-01-01

Microalgae are one of the most biologically important elements of worldwide ecology and could be the source of diverse new products and medicines. COBRA (The COnservation of a vital european scientific and Biotechnological Resource: microAlgae and cyanobacteria) is the acronym for a European Union, RTD Infrastructures project (Contract No. QLRI-CT-2001-01645). This project is in the process of developing a European Biological Resource Centre based on existing algal culture collections. The COBRA project's central aim is to apply cryopreservation methodologies to microalgae and cyanobacteria, organisms that, to date, have proved difficult to conserve using cryogenic methods. In addition, molecular and biochemical stability tests have been developed to ensure that the equivalent strains of microorganisms supplied by the culture collections give high quality and consistent performance. Fundamental and applied knowledge of stress physiology form an essential component of the project and this is being employed to assist the optimisation of methods for preserving a wide range of algal diversity. COBRA's "Resource Centre" utilises Information Technologies (IT) and Knowledge Management practices to assist project coordination, management and information dissemination and facilitate the generation of new knowledge pertaining to algal conservation. This review of the COBRA project will give a summary of current methodologies for cryopreservation of microalgae and procedures adopted within the COBRA project to enhance preservation techniques for this diverse group of organisms.

Theoretical and Computational Investigation of High-Brightness Beams

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Chen, Chiping

Theoretical and computational investigations of adiabatic thermal beams have been carried out in parameter regimes relevant to the development of advanced high-brightness, high-power accelerators for high-energy physics research and for various applications such as light sources. Most accelerator applications require high-brightness beams. This is true for high-energy accelerators such as linear colliders. It is also true for energy recovery linacs (ERLs) and free electron lasers (FELs) such as x-ray free electron lasers (XFELs). The breakthroughs and highlights in our research in the period from February 1, 2013 to November 30, 2013 were: a) Completion of a preliminary theoretical and computationalmore » study of adiabatic thermal Child-Langmuir flow (Mok, 2013); and b) Presentation of an invited paper entitled ?Adiabatic Thermal Beams in a Periodic Focusing Field? at Space Charge 2013 Workshop, CERN, April 16-19, 2013 (Chen, 2013). In this report, an introductory background for the research project is provided. Basic theory of adiabatic thermal Child-Langmuir flow is reviewed. Results of simulation studies of adiabatic thermal Child-Langmuir flows are discussed.« less

Successful private-public funding of paediatric medicines research: lessons from the EU programme to fund research into off-patent medicines.

PubMed

Ruggieri, L; Giannuzzi, V; Baiardi, P; Bonifazi, F; Davies, E H; Giaquinto, C; Bonifazi, D; Felisi, M; Chiron, C; Pressler, R; Rabe, H; Whitaker, M J; Neubert, A; Jacqz-Aigrain, E; Eichler, I; Turner, M A; Ceci, A

2015-04-01

The European Paediatric Regulation mandated the European Commission to fund research on off-patent medicines with demonstrated therapeutic interest for children. Responding to this mandate, five FP7 project calls were launched and 20 projects were granted. This paper aims to detail the funded projects and their preliminary results. Publicly available sources have been consulted and a descriptive analysis has been performed. Twenty Research Consortia including 246 partners in 29 European and non-European countries were created (involving 129 universities or public-funded research organisations, 51 private companies with 40 SMEs, 7 patient associations). The funded projects investigate 24 medicines, covering 10 therapeutic areas in all paediatric age groups. In response to the Paediatric Regulation and to apply for a Paediatric Use Marketing Authorisation, 15 Paediatric Investigation Plans have been granted by the EMA-Paediatric Committee, including 71 studies of whom 29 paediatric clinical trials, leading to a total of 7,300 children to be recruited in more than 380 investigational centres. Notwithstanding the EU contribution for each study is lower than similar publicly funded projects, and also considering the complexity of paediatric research, these projects are performing high-quality research and are progressing towards the increase of new paediatric medicines on the market. Private-public partnerships have been effectively implemented, providing a good example for future collaborative actions. Since these projects cover a limited number of off-patent drugs and many unmet therapeutic needs in paediatrics remain, it is crucial foreseeing new similar initiatives in forthcoming European funding programmes.

European Flagship Universities: Autonomy and Change

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Gornitzka, Åse; Maassen, Peter

2017-01-01

The article introduces this special issue of Higher Education Quarterly in which results of a research project on "European Flagship Universities: Balancing Academic Excellence and Socio-economic Relevance" are presented and discussed. The Flagship project aimed at contributing to a better understanding of the relationship between…

Implications for the U.S. of Anglo-French Defense Cooperation

DTIC Science & Technology

2012-04-30

multinational European military development projects are viewed with scepticism in the UK, the Anglo- French arrangement could strengthen the prospects...multinational European military development projects are viewed with scepticism in the UK, the Anglo- French arrangement could strengthen the prospects for...programme. The UK also dropped out of the Horizon Common New Generation Frigate project , which included France and Italy (Antill, 2011). Continued

Empowering patients through eHealth: a case report of a pan-European project.

PubMed

Lettieri, Emanuele; Fumagalli, Lia P; Radaelli, Giovanni; Bertele', Paolo; Vogt, Jess; Hammerschmidt, Reinhard; Lara, Juan L; Carriazo, Ana; Masella, Cristina

2015-08-05

This paper crystallises the experience developed by the pan-European PALANTE Consortium in dealing with the generation of relevant evidence from heterogeneous eHealth services for patient empowerment in nine European Regions. The European Commission (EC) recently funded a number of pan-European eHealth projects aimed at empowering European patients/citizens thus transforming the traditional patient/citizen role in the management of their health (e.g., PALANTE, SUSTAIN, CARRE, HeartCycle, Empower). However, the heterogeneity of the healthcare systems, of the implemented services and of the target patients, the use of ad-hoc definitions of the salient concepts and the development of small-size experiences have prevented the dissemination of "global" results and the development of cumulative knowledge. The main challenge has been the generation of large-scale evidence from heterogeneous small-size experiences. Three lessons have been collectively learnt during the development of the PALANTE project, which involves 9 sites that have implemented different eHealth services for empowering different typologies of patients. These lessons have been refined progressively through project meetings, reviews with the EC Project Officer and Reviewers. The paper illustrates the ten steps followed to develop the three lessons. The first lesson learnt is about how EC-funded projects should develop cumulative knowledge by avoiding self-crafted measures of outcome and by adopting literature-grounded definitions and scales. The second lesson learnt is about how EC-funded projects should identify ambitious, cross-pilot policy and research questions that allow pooling of data from across heterogeneous experiences even if a multi-centre study design was not agreed before. The third lesson learnt is about how EC-funded projects should open their collections of data and make them freely-accessible to the scientific community shortly after the conclusion of the project in order to guarantee the replicability of results and conclusions. The three lessons might provide original elements for fuelling the ongoing debate about the capability of the EC to develop evidence-based policies by pooling evidence from heterogeneous, local experiences.

The GEOFAR Project - Geothermal Finance and Awareness in Europeans Regions - Development of new schemes to overcome non-technical barriers, focusing particularly on financial barriers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Poux, Adeline; Wendel, Marco; Jaudin, Florence; Hiegl, Mathias

2010-05-01

Numerous advantages of geothermal energy like its widespread distribution, a base-load power and availability higher than 90%, a small footprint and low carbon emissions, and the growing concerns about climate changes strongly promote the development of geothermal projects. Geothermal energy as a local energy source implies needs on surface to be located close to the geothermal resource. Many European regions dispose of a good geothermal potential but it is mostly not sufficiently developed due to non-technical barriers occurring at the very early stages of the project. The GEOFAR Project carried out within the framework of EU's "Intelligent Energy Europe" (IEE) program, gathers a consortium of European partners from Germany, France, Greece, Spain and Portugal. Launched in September 2008, the aim of this research project is to analyze the mentioned non-technical barriers, focusing most particularly on economic and financial aspects. Based on this analysis GEOFAR aims at developing new financial and administrative schemes to overcome the main financial barriers for deep geothermal projects (for electricity and direct use, without heat pumps). The analysis of the current situation and the future development of geothermal energy in GEOFAR target countries (Germany, France, Greece, Spain, Portugal, Slovakia, Bulgaria and Hungary) was necessary to understand and expose the diverging status of the geothermal sector and the more and less complicated situation for geothermal projects in different Europeans Regions. A deeper analysis of 40 cases studies (operating, planned and failed projects) of deep geothermal projects also contributed to this detailed view. An exhaustive analysis and description of financial mechanisms already existing in different European countries and at European level to support investors completed the research on non-technical barriers. Based on this profound analysis, the GEOFAR project has made an overview of the difficulties met by project planners, developers and politicians when developing a new geothermal project. Each of the analyzed countries is facing a distinct bundle of non-technical barriers. Globally, deep geothermal projects are characterized by high up-front costs and are facing the geological risk of the non discovery of the resources in adequacy to the initial expectations. Moreover, investors are facing directly the competitiveness of fossils energy. The very long pay back period makes it also difficult for them to face the geological risk. GEOFAR will propose new targeting financing and funding schemes, in order to remove the financial barriers hindering the initial stages of geothermal energy projects. GEOFAR also considers a lack of awareness as important barrier hindering the future development of geothermal energy projects. Public opinion is globally positive to geothermal energy, but deep geothermal projects are often suffering from a lack of information leading sometimes to non public acceptance. By underlining the range of possibilities offered by the geothermal energy and the potential and emerging technologies, GEOFAR tends to increase the awareness of geothermal energy in order to boost the development and the investment in new geothermal energy projects. Geothermal energy is expected to contribute significantly to the future European energy sources and the GEOFAR project aims to facilitate it.

Where are we coming from versus who we will become: the effect of priming different contents of European identity on cooperation.

PubMed

La Barbera, Francesco; Ferrara, Pia Cariota; Boza, Mihaela

2014-12-01

In two experiments, we investigated how priming European identity as common project versus common heritage affects participants' cooperation in a social dilemma; an additional aim was to explore the mediators involved in the process. In the first experiment, 82 students played a public good dilemma with a European bogus partner and then completed self-report measures of identification with the European Union (EU), group-based trust and collective interest. Results showed that priming a common project-based but not a common heritage-based European social identity fostered cooperative behaviour; this effect was mediated by two sequential mediators: the common project prime increased participants' strength of identification with EU (mediator 1) which, in turn, positively affected group-based trust (mediator 2), fostering greater cooperation. Experiment 2 was conducted with a similar procedure on a sample of 124 students, using a different measure of trust and changing the order of mediators. Results supported those of previous experiment: Priming a project-based EU identity content (compared to heritage-based one) had significant direct and indirect effects on cooperation. © 2014 International Union of Psychological Science.

Migration modelling from food-contact plastics into foodstuffs as a new tool for consumer exposure estimation.

PubMed

Franz, R

2005-10-01

One important aspect within the European Union's public healthcare is the exposure of consumers to undesirable chemicals in the diet. Food-contact materials (FCM) are one potential contamination source and therefore of particular interest for food exposure assessment. On the other hand, scientific investigations concerning the migration potential and behaviour of food-packaging materials have demonstrated that diffusion in and migration from FCM are foreseeable physical and, in principle, mathematically describable processes. Because of this situation and the current state-of-the-art in migration science, a research project was initiated within the 5th Framework Programme of the European Commission. This project, with the acronym 'FOODMIGROSURE' (European Union Contract No. 'QLK1-CT2002-2390') started on 1 March 2003, was due to last 3 years and had the participation of nine European project partners (see the project website: www.foodmigrosure.org). The aim of the project was to extend currently existing migration models (which have been demonstrated to be applicable for less complex matrices such as food simulants) to foodstuffs themselves. In this way, the project aims to provide a novel and economic tool for estimation of consumer exposure to chemicals migrating from food-contact plastic materials under any actual contact conditions. In addition, the project aims to increase knowledge of the mechanisms of diffusion of organic compounds in foodstuffs and provide data on the partitioning effects between FCM and foods. Today the latter aspect is increasingly regarded as a fundamental influence parameter for migration into foods. Based on the project achievements, a much better scientific basis is available to allow scientifically appropriate amendments of European Union Directive 85/572/EEC as well as to support further developments with the so-called Plastics Directive 2002/72/EC. The paper introduces the project and presents an overview of the project work progress.

Structural biologists capture detailed image of gene regulator’s fleeting form | Center for Cancer Research

Cancer.gov

Using an ultrafast, high-intensity radiation source called an X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL), scientists have captured an atomic-level picture of an RNA structure called a riboswitch as it reorganizes itself to regulate protein production. The structure they visualized has never before been seen, and likely exists for only milliseconds after the riboswitch first encounters

Light-induced structural changes and the site of O=O bond formation in PSII caught by XFEL.

PubMed

Suga, Michihiro; Akita, Fusamichi; Sugahara, Michihiro; Kubo, Minoru; Nakajima, Yoshiki; Nakane, Takanori; Yamashita, Keitaro; Umena, Yasufumi; Nakabayashi, Makoto; Yamane, Takahiro; Nakano, Takamitsu; Suzuki, Mamoru; Masuda, Tetsuya; Inoue, Shigeyuki; Kimura, Tetsunari; Nomura, Takashi; Yonekura, Shinichiro; Yu, Long-Jiang; Sakamoto, Tomohiro; Motomura, Taiki; Chen, Jing-Hua; Kato, Yuki; Noguchi, Takumi; Tono, Kensuke; Joti, Yasumasa; Kameshima, Takashi; Hatsui, Takaki; Nango, Eriko; Tanaka, Rie; Naitow, Hisashi; Matsuura, Yoshinori; Yamashita, Ayumi; Yamamoto, Masaki; Nureki, Osamu; Yabashi, Makina; Ishikawa, Tetsuya; Iwata, So; Shen, Jian-Ren

2017-03-02

Photosystem II (PSII) is a huge membrane-protein complex consisting of 20 different subunits with a total molecular mass of 350 kDa for a monomer. It catalyses light-driven water oxidation at its catalytic centre, the oxygen-evolving complex (OEC). The structure of PSII has been analysed at 1.9 Å resolution by synchrotron radiation X-rays, which revealed that the OEC is a Mn 4 CaO 5 cluster organized in an asymmetric, 'distorted-chair' form. This structure was further analysed with femtosecond X-ray free electron lasers (XFEL), providing the 'radiation damage-free' structure. The mechanism of O=O bond formation, however, remains obscure owing to the lack of intermediate-state structures. Here we describe the structural changes in PSII induced by two-flash illumination at room temperature at a resolution of 2.35 Å using time-resolved serial femtosecond crystallography with an XFEL provided by the SPring-8 ångström compact free-electron laser. An isomorphous difference Fourier map between the two-flash and dark-adapted states revealed two areas of apparent changes: around the Q B /non-haem iron and the Mn 4 CaO 5 cluster. The changes around the Q B /non-haem iron region reflected the electron and proton transfers induced by the two-flash illumination. In the region around the OEC, a water molecule located 3.5 Å from the Mn 4 CaO 5 cluster disappeared from the map upon two-flash illumination. This reduced the distance between another water molecule and the oxygen atom O4, suggesting that proton transfer also occurred. Importantly, the two-flash-minus-dark isomorphous difference Fourier map showed an apparent positive peak around O5, a unique μ 4 -oxo-bridge located in the quasi-centre of Mn1 and Mn4 (refs 4,5). This suggests the insertion of a new oxygen atom (O6) close to O5, providing an O=O distance of 1.5 Å between these two oxygen atoms. This provides a mechanism for the O=O bond formation consistent with that proposed previously.

Italy in the Eu: Love Affair or Disillusionment? Italian Discontent with the European Integration Past and Present

DTIC Science & Technology

2014-06-01

in the formation of a European monetary union further contributing to the European countries’ political union . Among Italy’s reasons to participate...of abandoning participation in the EU project. 14. SUBJECT TERMS Italy, European Union , European institutions, Mussolini, Hitler, NATO...System EMU European Monetary Union EU European Union GDP gross domestic product Km kilometer IAI Istituto Affari Internazionali [Institute of

Coatings for FEL optics: preparation and characterization of B4C and Pt

PubMed Central

Störmer, Michael; Siewert, Frank; Horstmann, Christian; Buchheim, Jana; Gwalt, Grzegorz

2018-01-01

Large X-ray mirrors are required for beam transport at both present-day and future free-electron lasers (FELs) and synchrotron sources worldwide. The demand for large mirrors with lengths up to 1 m single layers consisting of light or heavy elements has increased during the last few decades. Accordingly, surface finishing technology is now able to produce large substrate lengths with micro-roughness on the sub-nanometer scale. At the Helmholtz-Zentrum Geesthacht (HZG), a 4.5 m-long sputtering facility enables us to deposit a desired single-layer material some tens of nanometers thick. For the European XFEL project, the shape error should be less than 2 nm over the whole 1 m X-ray mirror length to ensure the safe and efficient delivery of X-ray beams to the scientific instruments. The challenge is to achieve thin-film deposition on silicon substrates, benders and gratings without any change in mirror shape. Thin films of boron carbide and platinum with a thickness in the range 30–100 nm were manufactured using the HZG sputtering facility. This setup is able to cover areas of up to 1500 mm × 120 mm in one step using rectangular sputtering sources. The coatings produced were characterized using various thin-film methods. It was possible to improve the coating process to achieve a very high uniformity of the layer thickness. The movement of the substrate in front of the sputtering source has been optimized. A variation in B4C layer thickness below 1 nm (peak-to-valley) was achieved at a mean thickness of 51.8 nm over a deposition length of 1.5 m. In the case of Pt, reflectometry and micro-roughness measurements were performed. The uniformity in layer thickness was about 1 nm (peak-to-valley). The micro-roughness of the Pt layers showed no significant change in the coated state for layer thicknesses of 32 nm and 102 nm compared with the uncoated substrate state. The experimental results achieved will be discussed with regard to current restrictions and future developments. PMID:29271760

Coatings for FEL optics: preparation and characterization of B4C and Pt.

PubMed

Störmer, Michael; Siewert, Frank; Horstmann, Christian; Buchheim, Jana; Gwalt, Grzegorz

2018-01-01

Large X-ray mirrors are required for beam transport at both present-day and future free-electron lasers (FELs) and synchrotron sources worldwide. The demand for large mirrors with lengths up to 1 m single layers consisting of light or heavy elements has increased during the last few decades. Accordingly, surface finishing technology is now able to produce large substrate lengths with micro-roughness on the sub-nanometer scale. At the Helmholtz-Zentrum Geesthacht (HZG), a 4.5 m-long sputtering facility enables us to deposit a desired single-layer material some tens of nanometers thick. For the European XFEL project, the shape error should be less than 2 nm over the whole 1 m X-ray mirror length to ensure the safe and efficient delivery of X-ray beams to the scientific instruments. The challenge is to achieve thin-film deposition on silicon substrates, benders and gratings without any change in mirror shape. Thin films of boron carbide and platinum with a thickness in the range 30-100 nm were manufactured using the HZG sputtering facility. This setup is able to cover areas of up to 1500 mm × 120 mm in one step using rectangular sputtering sources. The coatings produced were characterized using various thin-film methods. It was possible to improve the coating process to achieve a very high uniformity of the layer thickness. The movement of the substrate in front of the sputtering source has been optimized. A variation in B 4 C layer thickness below 1 nm (peak-to-valley) was achieved at a mean thickness of 51.8 nm over a deposition length of 1.5 m. In the case of Pt, reflectometry and micro-roughness measurements were performed. The uniformity in layer thickness was about 1 nm (peak-to-valley). The micro-roughness of the Pt layers showed no significant change in the coated state for layer thicknesses of 32 nm and 102 nm compared with the uncoated substrate state. The experimental results achieved will be discussed with regard to current restrictions and future developments.

Paving the road for a European postgraduate training curriculum.

PubMed

van der Aa, Jessica E; Goverde, Angelique J; Teunissen, Pim W; Scheele, Fedde

2016-08-01

The 'Project for Achieving Consensus in Training' has been initiated by the European Board & College of Obstetrics and Gynaecology to harmonise training in Obstetrics and Gynaecology throughout Europe. In this project called the EBCOG-PACT, a state of the art pan-European training curriculum will be developed. Implementation of a pan-European curriculum will enhance harmonisation of both quality standards of women's healthcare practice and standards of postgraduate training. Secondly, it will assure equal quality of training of gynaecologists, promoting mobility throughout Europe. Thirdly, it will enhance cooperation and exchange of best practices between medical specialists and hospitals within Europe. The project is expecting to deliver (1) a description of the core and electives of the curriculum based on previously defined standards of care, (2) a societally responsive competency framework based on input from societal stakeholders and (3) strategies for education and assessment based on the current literature. Also, the project focuses on implementation and sustainability of the curriculum by delivering (4) a SWOT-analysis for the implementation based on insights into transcultural differences, (5) recommendations for implementation, change management and sustainability based on the SWOT analysis (6) and finally a handbook for other specialties initiating European curriculum development. The development and the implementation of this modern pan-European curriculum in Obstetrics and Gynaecology aims to serve as an example for the harmonisation of postgraduate training in Europe. Copyright © 2016. Published by Elsevier Ireland Ltd.

The European Language Portfolio and Languages for Specific Purposes: A Project to Develop "Can Do" Descriptors Focused on Students' Interests and Motivation

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Gori, Federica

2014-01-01

Projects related to the European Language Portfolio (ELP) carried out at the Language Centre of the University of Trieste are concerned to examine whether and to what extent "can do" descriptors can be extended to courses in Languages for Specific Purposes. The project reported in this article had two aims. The first was to explore what…

Use of Simulation in Nursing Education: Initial Experiences on a European Union Lifelong Learning Programme--Leonardo Da Vinci Project

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Terzioglu, Fusun; Tuna, Zahide; Duygulu, Sergul; Boztepe, Handan; Kapucu, Sevgisun; Ozdemir, Leyla; Akdemir, Nuran; Kocoglu, Deniz; Alinier, Guillaume; Festini, Filippo

2013-01-01

Aim: The aim of this paper is to share the initial experiences on a European Union (EU) Lifelong Learning Programme Leonardo Da Vinci Transfer of Innovation Project related to the use of simulation-based learning with nursing students from Turkey. The project started at the end of the 2010 involving 7 partners from 3 different countries including…

Rankings in Institutional Strategies and Processes: Impact or Illusion?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hazelkorn, Ellen; Loukkola, Tia; Zhang, Thérèse

2014-01-01

The "Rankings in Institutional Strategies and Processes" (RISP) project is the first pan-European study of the impact and influence of rankings on European higher education institutions. The project has sought to build understanding of how rankings impact and influence the development of institutional strategies and processes and its…

iTEC: Conceptualising, Realising and Recognising Pedagogical and Technological Innovation in European Classrooms

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cranmer, Sue; Lewin, Cathy

2017-01-01

Innovation, a complex concept, underpinned a four-year pan-European research project designed to increase the effective use of technology in school classrooms. This article revisits evaluation data collected during the project and explores the challenges of conceptualising, realising and researching "innovation." The authors describe how…

Get Networked and Spy Your Languages

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Rico, Mercedes; Ferreira, Paula; Dominguez, Eva M.; Coppens, Julian

2012-01-01

Our proposal describes ISPY, a multilateral European K2 language project based on the development of an Online Networking Platform for Language Learning (http://www.ispy-project.com/). Supported by the Lifelong Learning European Programme, the platform aims to help young adults across Europe, secondary and vocational school programs, learn a new…

Identification of Good Practices in the Implementation of Innovative Learning Methodologies

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lincaru, Cristina; Ciuca, Vasilica; Grecu, Liliana; Atanasiu, Draga; Dragoiu, Codruta

2011-01-01

We intend to present the partial issues resulted from the development of the European Project DeInTRA "cooperation for innovative training methodologies deployment in the European Labour Market"--Stage 4: Identification of good practices in the implementation of innovative learning methodologies. This project is included into the…

A European multi-language initiative to make the general population aware of independent clinical research: the European Communication on Research Awareness Need project.

PubMed

Mosconi, Paola; Antes, Gerd; Barbareschi, Giorgio; Burls, Amanda; Demotes-Mainard, Jacques; Chalmers, Iain; Colombo, Cinzia; Garattini, Silvio; Gluud, Christian; Gyte, Gill; Mcllwain, Catherine; Penfold, Matt; Post, Nils; Satolli, Roberto; Valetto, Maria Rosa; West, Brian; Wolff, Stephanie

2016-01-12

The ECRAN (European Communication on Research Awareness Needs) project was initiated in 2012, with support from the European Commission, to improve public knowledge about the importance of independent, multinational, clinical trials in Europe. Participants in the ECRAN consortium included clinicians and methodologists directly involved in clinical trials; researchers working in partnership with the public and patients; representatives of patients; and experts in science communication. We searched for, and evaluated, relevant existing materials and developed additional materials and tools, making them freely available under a Creative Commons licence. The principal communication materials developed were: 1. A website ( http://ecranproject.eu ) in six languages, including a Media centre section to help journalists to disseminate information about the ECRAN project 2. An animated film about clinical trials, dubbed in the 23 official languages of the European Community, and an interactive tutorial 3. An inventory of resources, available in 23 languages, searchable by topic, author, and media type 4. Two educational games for young people, developed in six languages 5. Testing Treatments interactive in a dozen languages, including five official European Community languages 6. An interactive tutorial slide presentation testing viewers' knowledge about clinical trials Over a 2-year project, our multidisciplinary and multinational consortium was able to produce, and make freely available in many languages, new materials to promote public knowledge about the importance of independent and international clinical trials. Sustained funding for the ECRAN information platform could help to promote successful recruitment to independent clinical trials supported through the European Clinical Research Infrastructure Network.

The PATH project in eight European countries: an evaluation.

PubMed

Veillard, Jeremy Henri Maurice; Schiøtz, Michaela Louise; Guisset, Ann-Lise; Brown, Adalsteinn Davidson; Klazinga, Niek S

2013-01-01

This paper's aim is to evaluate the perceived impact and the enabling factors and barriers experienced by hospital staff participating in an international hospital performance measurement project focused on internal quality improvement. Semi-structured interviews involving international hospital performance measurement project coordinators, including 140 hospitals from eight European countries (Belgium, Estonia, France, Germany, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia). Inductively analyzing the interview transcripts was carried out using the grounded theory approach. Even when public reporting is absent, the project was perceived as having stimulated performance measurement and quality improvement initiatives in participating hospitals. Attention should be paid to leadership/ownership, context, content (project intrinsic features) and processes supporting elements. Generalizing the findings is limited by the study's small sample size. Possible implications for the WHO European Regional Office and for participating hospitals would be to assess hospital preparedness to participate in the PATH project, depending on context, process and structural elements; and enhance performance and practice benchmarking through suggested approaches. This research gathered rich and unique material related to an international performance measurement project. It derived actionable findings.

Academic Entrepreneurship vs. Changing Governance and Institutional Management Structures at European Universities

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kwiek, Marek

2008-01-01

This article discusses academic entrepreneurship in the context of ongoing changes in university management and governance in European universities. The comparative perspective is provided by the European Union (EU) research project "European Universities for Entrepreneurship: Their Role in the Europe of Knowledge" (EUEREK) comprising…

Eliminating Language Barriers Online at European Prisons (ELBEP): A Case-Study

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Barkan, M.; Toprak, E.; Kumtepe, A. T.; Kumtepe, E. Genc; Ataizi, M.; Pilanci, H.; Mutlu, M. E.; Kayabas, I.; Kayabas, B. Kip

2011-01-01

ELBEP (Eliminating Language Barriers in European Prisons Through Open and Distance Education Technology) is a multilateral project funded by the European Union (EU) Lifelong Learning, Grundtvig (Adult Education) Programme. It aims to overcome language/communication problems between prison staff and foreign inmates at European prisons via online…

EUPOS - Satellite multifunctional system of reference stations in Central and Eastern Europe

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sledzinski, J.

2003-04-01

The European project EUPOS (European Position Determination System) of establishment of a system of multifunctional satellite reference stations in Central and Eastern Europe is described in the paper. Fifteen countries intend to participate in the project: Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Germany, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovak Republic and Slovenia. One common project will be prepared for all countries, however it will include the existing or developed infrastructure in particular countries. The experiences of establishing and operating of the German network SAPOS as well as experiences gained by other countries will be used. The European network of stations will be compatible with the system SAPOS and future European system Galileo. The network of reference stations will provide signal for both positioning of the geodetic control points and for land, air and marine navigation. Several levels of positioning accuracy will be delivered.

Tributyltin--critical pollutant in whole water samples--development of traceable measurement methods for monitoring under the European Water Framework Directive (WFD) 2000/60/EC.

PubMed

Richter, Janine; Fettig, Ina; Philipp, Rosemarie; Jakubowski, Norbert

2015-07-01

Tributyltin is listed as one of the priority substances in the European Water Framework Directive (WFD). Despite its decreasing input in the environment, it is still present and has to be monitored. In the European Metrology Research Programme project ENV08, a sensitive and reliable analytical method according to the WFD was developed to quantify this environmental pollutant at a very low limit of quantification. With the development of such a primary reference method for tributyltin, the project helped to improve the quality and comparability of monitoring data. An overview of project aims and potential analytical tools is given.

Structural biologists capture detailed image of gene regulator’s fleeting form | Center for Cancer Research

Cancer.gov

Using an ultrafast, high-intensity radiation source called an X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL), scientists have captured an atomic-level picture of an RNA structure called a riboswitch as it reorganizes itself to regulate protein production. The structure they visualized has never before been seen, and likely exists for only milliseconds after the riboswitch first encounters its activating molecule.  Read more...  

Scattering Response of Sucrose Clusters with Intense XFEL Pulses in Water Window

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ho, Phay; Benedikt Daurer, Benedikt; Bielecki, Johan; Hantke, Max; Maia, Filipe; Knight, Chris; Hajdu, Janos; Young, Linda; Bostedt, Christoph

2017-04-01

We present a combined experimental and theoretical study about the effects of non-linear x-ray ionization dynamics on the scattering response of molecular clusters in the soft x-ray regime that includes and goes beyond the water window. Nanosized sucrose clusters were irradiated with intense XFEL pulses (photon energy from 500 to 1500 eV and pulse duration of 180 fs). Surprisingly, the measured scattering signals near the oxygen K-edge in the water window are found to be substantially smaller than those at higher photon energies. We employ Monte-Carlo/Molecular Dynamics calculations to investigate the x-ray processes as a function of pulse parameters (photon energy, bandwidth and pulse duration) and cluster size. We demonstrate the important role of resonant excitation (RE) in the molecular scattering response in the water window. In particular, 1s ->2p RE cycling enabled in the oxygen atom/ion provide additional ionization pathways which, combined with the long pulse duration, lead to substantial reduction in scattering power of sugar clusters for photon energies just below the oxygen K-edge. Supported by the Chemical Sciences, Geosciences, and Biosciences Division, Office of Basic Energy Sciences, Office of Science, US Dept of Energy, Contract DE-AC02-06CH11357.

Angular correlations of photons from solution diffraction at a free-electron laser encode molecular structure

DOE PAGES

Mendez, Derek; Watkins, Herschel; Qiao, Shenglan; ...

2016-09-26

During X-ray exposure of a molecular solution, photons scattered from the same molecule are correlated. If molecular motion is insignificant during exposure, then differences in momentum transfer between correlated photons are direct measurements of the molecular structure. In conventional small- and wide-angle solution scattering, photon correlations are ignored. This report presents advances in a new biomolecular structural analysis technique, correlated X-ray scattering (CXS), which uses angular intensity correlations to recover hidden structural details from molecules in solution. Due to its intense rapid pulses, an X-ray free electron laser (XFEL) is an excellent tool for CXS experiments. A protocol is outlinedmore » for analysis of a CXS data set comprising a total of half a million X-ray exposures of solutions of small gold nanoparticles recorded at the Spring-8 Ångström Compact XFEL facility (SACLA). From the scattered intensities and their correlations, two populations of nanoparticle domains within the solution are distinguished: small twinned, and large probably non-twinned domains. Finally, it is shown analytically how, in a solution measurement, twinning information is only accessible via intensity correlations, demonstrating how CXS reveals atomic-level information from a disordered solution of like molecules.« less

Anisotropy enhanced X-ray scattering from solvated transition metal complexes

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Biasin, Elisa; van Driel, Tim B.; Levi, Gianluca

Time-resolved X-ray scattering patterns from photoexcited molecules in solution are in many cases anisotropic at the ultrafast time scales accessible at X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs). This anisotropy arises from the interaction of a linearly polarized UV–Vis pump laser pulse with the sample, which induces anisotropic structural changes that can be captured by femtosecond X-ray pulses. In this work, a method for quantitative analysis of the anisotropic scattering signal arising from an ensemble of molecules is described, and it is demonstrated how its use can enhance the structural sensitivity of the time-resolved X-ray scattering experiment. This method is applied on time-resolvedmore » X-ray scattering patterns measured upon photoexcitation of a solvated di-platinum complex at an XFEL, and the key parameters involved are explored. Here it is shown that a combined analysis of the anisotropic and isotropic difference scattering signals in this experiment allows a more precise determination of the main photoinduced structural change in the solute,i.e.the change in Pt—Pt bond length, and yields more information on the excitation channels than the analysis of the isotropic scattering only. Finally, it is discussed how the anisotropic transient response of the solvent can enable the determination of key experimental parameters such as the instrument response function.« less

Advances in Large Grain/Single Crystal SC Resonators at DESY

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

W. Singer; A. Brinkmann; A. Ermakov

The main aim of the DESY large grain R&D program is to check whether this option is reasonable to apply for fabrication of ca. 1'000 XFEL cavities. Two aspects are being pursued. On one hand the basic material investigation, on the other hand the material availability, fabrication and preparation procedure. Several single cell large grain cavities of TESLA shape have been fabricated and tested. The best accelerating gradients of 41 MV/m was measured on electropolished cavity. First large grain nine-cell cavities worldwide have been produced under contract of DESY with ACCEL Instruments Co. All three cavities fulfil the XFEL specificationmore » already in first RF test after only BCP (Buffered Chemical Polishing) treatment and 800 degrees C annealing. Accelerating gradient of 27 - 29 MV/m was reached. A fabrication method of single crystal cavity of ILC like shape was proposed. A single cell single crystal cavity was build at the company ACCEL. Accelerating gradient of 37.5 MV/m reached after only 112 microns BCP and in situ baking 120 degrees C for 6 hrs with the quality factor higher as 2x1010. The developed method can be extended on fabrication of multi cell single crystal cavities.« less

Anisotropy enhanced X-ray scattering from solvated transition metal complexes

DOE PAGES

Biasin, Elisa; van Driel, Tim B.; Levi, Gianluca; ...

2018-02-13

Time-resolved X-ray scattering patterns from photoexcited molecules in solution are in many cases anisotropic at the ultrafast time scales accessible at X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs). This anisotropy arises from the interaction of a linearly polarized UV–Vis pump laser pulse with the sample, which induces anisotropic structural changes that can be captured by femtosecond X-ray pulses. In this work, a method for quantitative analysis of the anisotropic scattering signal arising from an ensemble of molecules is described, and it is demonstrated how its use can enhance the structural sensitivity of the time-resolved X-ray scattering experiment. This method is applied on time-resolvedmore » X-ray scattering patterns measured upon photoexcitation of a solvated di-platinum complex at an XFEL, and the key parameters involved are explored. Here it is shown that a combined analysis of the anisotropic and isotropic difference scattering signals in this experiment allows a more precise determination of the main photoinduced structural change in the solute,i.e.the change in Pt—Pt bond length, and yields more information on the excitation channels than the analysis of the isotropic scattering only. Finally, it is discussed how the anisotropic transient response of the solvent can enable the determination of key experimental parameters such as the instrument response function.« less

Pan-European management of coastal lagoons: A science-policy-stakeholder interface perspective

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lillebø, Ana I.; Stålnacke, Per; Gooch, Geoffrey D.; Krysanova, Valentina; Bielecka, Małgorzata

2017-11-01

The main objective of the work carried out in the scope of a three years collaborative research project was to develop science-based strategies and a decision support framework for the integrated management of coastal lagoons and their catchments and, in this context, to enhance connectivity between research and policymaking. In this paper our main objective is to share the lessons learned from the innovative methodology used throughout the project. To achieve the proposed objectives, the multidisciplinary scientific knowledge in the project team was combined and integrated with the knowledge and views of local stakeholders of four selected European coastal lagoons, using a three step participatory approach. With this innovative approach, which included the usage of eco-hydrological and water quality-modelling tools, the team developed and analyzed integrated scenarios of possible economic development and environmental impacts in four European lagoons and their catchments. These scenarios were presented and discussed with stakeholders, giving rise to management recommendations for each case study lagoon. Results show that some management options might be transferrable to other European lagoons having similar climatic, geophysical and socio-economic settings. In management terms, the project output provides a set of policy guidelines derived from the different analyses conducted and proposes initiatives concerning management implementation in a local-regional-national-European setting.

EURO-CARES as Roadmap for a European Sample Curation Facility

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Brucato, J. R.; Russell, S.; Smith, C.; Hutzler, A.; Meneghin, A.; Aléon, J.; Bennett, A.; Berthoud, L.; Bridges, J.; Debaille, V.; Ferrière, L.; Folco, L.; Foucher, F.; Franchi, I.; Gounelle, M.; Grady, M.; Leuko, S.; Longobardo, A.; Palomba, E.; Pottage, T.; Rettberg, P.; Vrublevskis, J.; Westall, F.; Zipfel, J.; Euro-Cares Team

2018-04-01

EURO-CARES is a three-year multinational project funded under the European Commission Horizon2020 research program to develop a roadmap for a European Extraterrestrial Sample Curation Facility for samples returned from solar system missions.

A European Flagship Programme on Extreme Computing and Climate

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Palmer, Tim

2017-04-01

In 2016, an outline proposal co-authored by a number of leading climate modelling scientists from around Europe for a (c. 1 billion euro) flagship project on exascale computing and high-resolution global climate modelling was sent to the EU via its Future and Emerging Flagship Technologies Programme. The project is formally entitled "A Flagship European Programme on Extreme Computing and Climate (EPECC)"? In this talk I will outline the reasons why I believe such a project is needed and describe the current status of the project. I will leave time for some discussion.

Domestic Abuse Prevention Education: Listening to the Views of Young People

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Fox, Claire L.; Hale, Rebecca; Gadd, David

2014-01-01

This paper reports on findings derived as part of a two-year project funded by the European Union's Daphne III scheme, involving collaboration between seven partner organisations across six European countries. The project involved an evaluation, using questionnaires and focus groups, of domestic abuse prevention education programmes delivered in…

Masculinities in Organizational Cultures in Engineering Education in Europe: Results of the European Union Project WomEng

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sagebiel, F.; Dahmen, J.

2006-01-01

The paper describes elements of engineering organizational cultures and structures in higher engineering education from the European project WomEng. Hypotheses, based on state of the art, refer to: women friendly presentation, attractiveness of interdisciplinary teaching methods, single sex education, perceptions of minority status, feelings of…

Archives, Libraries and Museums as Communicators of Memory in the European Union Projects

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Manzuch, Zinaida

2009-01-01

Introduction: Explores the approach to communication of memory in archives, libraries and museums in European Union research projects in 2000-2005. The main objectives were: to identify predominant aspects of heritage communication; to determine whether and how heritage communication was related to memory; to establish patterns of participation in…

Ethnic Heritage Studies: Southern European Foods. Experimental Unit.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Freepartner, Susan

This teaching guide focuses on the Southern European food heritage. It is part of the Louisville Area Ethnic Heritage Studies Project described in ED 150 043. The project materials are designed to foster communication across intercultural/ethnic lines. The objective of this unit is to gain familiarity with and appreciate foods from Spain, France,…

Using Space to Inspire and Engage Children

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Clements, Allan

2015-01-01

The European Space Education Resources Office (ESERO-UK) is a project of the European Space Agency (ESA) and national partners including the Department for Education (DfE), The UK Space Agency (UKSA) and the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC). The key objective of the project is to promote space as an exciting inspirational context…

European project RETAIN: new approach for IBC in teleradiology and PACS based on full ATM network

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Cordonnier, Emmanuel; Jensch, Peter F.; Piqueras, Joachim; Gandon, Yves

1995-05-01

This paper describes the RETAIN project (radiological examination transfer on ATM Integrated Network), which is supported by the European Community, in the frame of the TEN-IBC program (trans-European networks integrated broad band communication). It links together three European sites in France (Rennes), Spain (Barcelona), and Germany (Oldenburg) and involves a partnership between the public national operators France Telecom, Telefonica, and Telekom. One important reason to explicitly consider asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) for medical imaging is that multimedia applications on such networks allow integration of digital data and person-to-person communication. The RETAIN project includes trials of teleworking sessions between radiologists of Rennes and Barcelona within a clinical and/or scientific context based on ATM equipments performing DICOM transfer on examination, digital remote manipulation within a comprehensive dialogue, and high quality visiophony on ATM adaptation layer (AAL) type 1. The project includes also visiophony trials with Oldenburg and preparation of harmonized regional experimentation within an emergency context. The network used is a full 10 Mbits/s ATM network directly connected to local PACSs.

The potential of transnational language policy to promote social inclusion of immigrants: An analysis and evaluation of the European Union's INCLUDE project

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bian, Cui

2017-08-01

Language issues and social inclusion consistently remain two major concerns for member countries of the European Union (EU). Despite an increasing awareness of the importance of language learning in migrants' social inclusion, and the promotion of language policies at European and national levels, there is still a lack of common actions at the European level. Challenged by questions as to whether language learning should be prioritised as a human right or as human capital building, how host/mainstream language learning can be reinforced while respecting language diversity, and other problems, member countries still need to find solutions. Confronting these dilemmas, this study analyses the relationship and interactions between language learning and immigrants' social inclusion in different contexts. It explores the potential of enhancing the effectiveness of language policies via a dialogue between policies and practices in different national contexts and research studies in the field of language and social inclusion. The research data are derived from two databases created by a European policy for active social inclusion project called INCLUDE. This project ran from 2013 to 2016 under the EU's lifelong learning programme, with funding support from the European Commission. Through an analysis of these two project databases, the paper reviews recent national language policies and their effect on the social inclusion of migrants. In the second part of her article, the author interprets the process of language learning and social inclusion using poststructuralist theories of language and identity.

The Emergence and Institutionalisation of the European Higher Education and Research Area

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Beerkens, Eric

2008-01-01

Since the European unification project started in the 1950s, rules, regulations and policies have been formulated by the European Union (and its predecessors) to facilitate the flow of products and people; those who benefited from the increasing transnational exchange urged European actors to remove remaining obstacles and further facilitate…

How Is European Governance Configuring the EHEA?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Magalhães, António; Veiga, Amélia; Sousa, Sofia; Ribeiro, Filipa

2012-01-01

This article focuses on the interaction between the European dimension driven by the creation of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) and the development of national reforms to fulfil that objective. On the basis of data gathered in eight countries involved in EuroHESC project TRUE (Transforming European Universities), the curricular and the…

Governing by Inspection? European Inspectorates and the Creation of a European Education Policy Space

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Grek, Sotiria; Lawn, Martin; Ozga, Jenny; Segerholm, Christina

2013-01-01

This paper draws on the first, completed phase of a research project on inspection as governing in three European inspection systems. The data presented here draw attention to the rather under-researched associational activities of European inspectorates and their developing practices of policy learning and exchange, and highlight their…

Pan European Phenological database (PEP725): a single point of access for European data.

PubMed

Templ, Barbara; Koch, Elisabeth; Bolmgren, Kjell; Ungersböck, Markus; Paul, Anita; Scheifinger, Helfried; Rutishauser, This; Busto, Montserrat; Chmielewski, Frank-M; Hájková, Lenka; Hodzić, Sabina; Kaspar, Frank; Pietragalla, Barbara; Romero-Fresneda, Ramiro; Tolvanen, Anne; Vučetič, Višnja; Zimmermann, Kirsten; Zust, Ana

2018-06-01

The Pan European Phenology (PEP) project is a European infrastructure to promote and facilitate phenological research, education, and environmental monitoring. The main objective is to maintain and develop a Pan European Phenological database (PEP725) with an open, unrestricted data access for science and education. PEP725 is the successor of the database developed through the COST action 725 "Establishing a European phenological data platform for climatological applications" working as a single access point for European-wide plant phenological data. So far, 32 European meteorological services and project partners from across Europe have joined and supplied data collected by volunteers from 1868 to the present for the PEP725 database. Most of the partners actively provide data on a regular basis. The database presently holds almost 12 million records, about 46 growing stages and 265 plant species (including cultivars), and can be accessed via http://www.pep725.eu/ . Users of the PEP725 database have studied a diversity of topics ranging from climate change impact, plant physiological question, phenological modeling, and remote sensing of vegetation to ecosystem productivity.

Pan European Phenological database (PEP725): a single point of access for European data

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Templ, Barbara; Koch, Elisabeth; Bolmgren, Kjell; Ungersböck, Markus; Paul, Anita; Scheifinger, Helfried; Rutishauser, This; Busto, Montserrat; Chmielewski, Frank-M.; Hájková, Lenka; Hodzić, Sabina; Kaspar, Frank; Pietragalla, Barbara; Romero-Fresneda, Ramiro; Tolvanen, Anne; Vučetič, Višnja; Zimmermann, Kirsten; Zust, Ana

2018-02-01

The Pan European Phenology (PEP) project is a European infrastructure to promote and facilitate phenological research, education, and environmental monitoring. The main objective is to maintain and develop a Pan European Phenological database (PEP725) with an open, unrestricted data access for science and education. PEP725 is the successor of the database developed through the COST action 725 "Establishing a European phenological data platform for climatological applications" working as a single access point for European-wide plant phenological data. So far, 32 European meteorological services and project partners from across Europe have joined and supplied data collected by volunteers from 1868 to the present for the PEP725 database. Most of the partners actively provide data on a regular basis. The database presently holds almost 12 million records, about 46 growing stages and 265 plant species (including cultivars), and can be accessed via http://www.pep725.eu/. Users of the PEP725 database have studied a diversity of topics ranging from climate change impact, plant physiological question, phenological modeling, and remote sensing of vegetation to ecosystem productivity.

How the bioanalytical scientist plays a key role in interdisciplinary project teams in the development of biotherapeutics - a reflection of the European Bioanalysis Forum.

PubMed

Dudal, Sherri; Staack, Roland F; Stoellner, Daniela; Fjording, Marianne Scheel; Vieser, Eva; Pascual, Marie-Hélène; Brudny-Kloeppel, Margarete; Golob, Michaela

2014-05-01

The bioanalytical scientist plays a key role in the project team for the drug development of biotherapeutics from the discovery to the marketing phase. Information from the project team members is required for assay development and sample analysis during the discovery, preclinical and clinical phases of the project and input is needed from the bioanalytical scientist to help data interpretation. The European Bioanalysis Forum target team 20 discussed many of the gaps in information and communication between the bioanalytical scientist and project team members as a base for providing a perspective on the bioanalytical scientist's role and interactions within the project team.

The 'European Alliance Against Depression (EAAD)': a multifaceted, community-based action programme against depression and suicidality.

PubMed

Hegerl, Ulrich; Wittmann, Meike; Arensman, Ella; Van Audenhove, Chantal; Bouleau, Jean-Hervé; Van Der Feltz-Cornelis, Christina; Gusmao, Ricardo; Kopp, Maria; Löhr, Cordula; Maxwell, Margaret; Meise, Ulrich; Mirjanic, Milan; Oskarsson, Högni; Sola, Victor Perez; Pull, Charles; Pycha, Roger; Ricka, Regula; Tuulari, Jyrki; Värnik, Airi; Pfeiffer-Gerschel, Tim

2008-01-01

Action programmes fostering partnerships and bringing together regional and national authorities to promote the care of depressed patients are urgently needed. In 2001 the 'Nuremberg Alliance Against Depression' was initiated as a community-based model project within the large-scale 'German Research Network on Depression and Suicidality' (Kompetenznetz 'Depression, Suizidalität'). The 'Nuremberg Alliance Against Depression' was an action programme, conducted in the city of Nuremberg (500,000 inhabitants) in 2001/2002, addressing four intervention levels (Hegerl et al. Psychol Med 2006;36:1225). Based on the positive results of the Nuremberg project (a significant reduction of suicidal behaviour by more than 20%) 18 international partners representing 16 different European countries established the 'European Alliance Against Depression' (EAAD) in 2004. Based on the four-level approach of the Nuremberg project, all regional partners initiated respective regional intervention programmes addressing depression and suicidality. Evaluation of the activities takes place on regional and international levels. This paper gives a brief overview of the background for and experiences with the EAAD. It describes the components of the programme, provides the rationale for the intervention and outlines the current status of the project. The aim of the paper is to disseminate information about the programme's potential to reduce suicidal behaviour and to provide examples of how European community-based 'best practice' models for improving the care of depressed patients and suicidal persons can be implemented using a bottom-up approach. EAAD is mentioned by the European commission as a best practice example within the Green Paper 'Improving the mental health of the population: Towards a strategy on mental health for the European Union' (European Commission 2005).

The European Project Semester at ISEP: the challenge of educating global engineers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Malheiro, Benedita; Silva, Manuel; Ribeiro, Maria Cristina; Guedes, Pedro; Ferreira, Paulo

2015-05-01

Current engineering education challenges require approaches that promote scientific, technical, design and complementary skills while fostering autonomy, innovation and responsibility. The European Project Semester (EPS) at Instituto Superior de Engenharia do Porto (ISEP) (EPS@ISEP) is a one semester project-based learning programme (30 European Credit Transfer Units (ECTU)) for engineering students from diverse scientific backgrounds and nationalities that intends to address these goals. The students, organised in multidisciplinary and multicultural teams, are challenged to solve real multidisciplinary problems during one semester. The EPS package, although on project development (20 ECTU), includes a series of complementary seminars aimed at fostering soft, project-related and engineering transversal skills (10 ECTU). Hence, the students enrolled in this programme improve their transversal skills and learn, together and with the team of supervisors, subjects distinct from their core training. This paper presents the structure, implementation and results of the EPS@ISEP that was created in 2011 to apply the best engineering practices and promote internationalisation and engineering education innovation at ISEP.

Highlight report: Launch of a large integrated European in vitro toxicology project: EU-ToxRisk.

PubMed

Daneshian, Mardas; Kamp, Hennicke; Hengstler, Jan; Leist, Marcel; van de Water, Bob

2016-05-01

The integrated European project, EU-ToxRisk, proudly sees itself as "flagship" exploring new alternative-to-animal approaches to chemical safety evaluation. It promotes mechanism-based toxicity testing and risk assessment according to the principles laid down for toxicology for the twenty-first century. The project was officially launched in January 2016 with a kickoff meeting in Egmond aan Zee, the Netherlands. Over 100 scientists representing academia and industry as well as regulatory authorities attended the inaugural meeting. The project will integrate advances in in vitro and in silico toxicology, read-across methods, and adverse outcome pathways. EU-ToxRisk will continue to make use of the case study strategy deployed in SEURAT-1, a FP7 initiative ended in December 2015. Even though the development of new non-animal methods is one target of EU-ToxRisk, the project puts special emphasis on their acceptance and implementation in regulatory contexts. This €30 million Horizon 2020 project involves 38 European partners and one from the USA. EU-ToxRisk aims at the "development of a new way of risk assessment."

European Extremely Large Telescope: progress report

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tamai, R.; Spyromilio, J.

2014-07-01

The European Extremely Large Telescope is a project of the European Southern Observatory to build and operate a 40-m class optical near-infrared telescope. The telescope design effort is largely concluded and construction contracts are being placed with industry and academic/research institutes for the various components. The siting of the telescope in Northern Chile close to the Paranal site allows for an integrated operation of the facility providing significant economies. The progress of the project in various areas is presented in this paper and references to other papers at this SPIE meeting are made.

SEE-GRID eInfrastructure for Regional eScience

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Prnjat, Ognjen; Balaz, Antun; Vudragovic, Dusan; Liabotis, Ioannis; Sener, Cevat; Marovic, Branko; Kozlovszky, Miklos; Neagu, Gabriel

In the past 6 years, a number of targeted initiatives, funded by the European Commission via its information society and RTD programmes and Greek infrastructure development actions, have articulated a successful regional development actions in South East Europe that can be used as a role model for other international developments. The SEEREN (South-East European Research and Education Networking initiative) project, through its two phases, established the SEE segment of the pan-European G ´EANT network and successfully connected the research and scientific communities in the region. Currently, the SEE-LIGHT project is working towards establishing a dark-fiber backbone that will interconnect most national Research and Education networks in the region. On the distributed computing and storage provisioning i.e. Grid plane, the SEE-GRID (South-East European GRID e-Infrastructure Development) project, similarly through its two phases, has established a strong human network in the area of scientific computing and has set up a powerful regional Grid infrastructure, and attracted a number of applications from different fields from countries throughout the South-East Europe. The current SEEGRID-SCI project, ending in April 2010, empowers the regional user communities from fields of meteorology, seismology and environmental protection in common use and sharing of the regional e-Infrastructure. Current technical initiatives in formulation are focusing on a set of coordinated actions in the area of HPC and application fields making use of HPC initiatives. Finally, the current SEERA-EI project brings together policy makers - programme managers from 10 countries in the region. The project aims to establish a communication platform between programme managers, pave the way towards common e-Infrastructure strategy and vision, and implement concrete actions for common funding of electronic infrastructures on the regional level. The regional vision on establishing an e-Infrastructure compatible with European developments, and empowering the scientists in the region in equal participation in the use of pan- European infrastructures, is materializing through the above initiatives. This model has a number of concrete operational and organizational guidelines which can be adapted to help e-Infrastructure developments in other world regions. In this paper we review the most important developments and contributions by the SEEGRID- SCI project.

NUMERIC: Statistics for the Digitisation of European Cultural Heritage

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Poll, Roswitha

2010-01-01

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to present results of NUMERIC, a project of the European Commission that started out to define measures and methods for assessing the current state of digitisation in Europe's cultural institutions (archives, libraries and museums). The central task of the NUMERIC project was to develop a framework for the…

The Pedagogic Architecture of MOOC: A Research Project on Educational Courses in Spanish

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Fernández-Díaz, Elia; Rodríguez-Hoyos, Carlos; Salvador, Adelina Calvo

2017-01-01

This study has been carried out within the context of the ECO European Project (E-learning, Communication Open-Data: Massive Mobile, Ubiquitous, and Open Learning) which is being financed by the European Union over four years (2014-17). It analyses the pedagogic architecture of MOOC on pedagogic/educational subjects in Spanish over one academic…

Projecting Long-Term Care Expenditure in Four European Union Member States: The Influence of Demographic Scenarios

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Costa-Font, Joan; Wittenberg, Raphael; Patxot, Concepcio; Comas-Herrera, Adelina; Gori, Cristiano; di Maio, Alessandra; Pickard, Linda; Pozzi, Alessandro; Rothgang, Heinz

2008-01-01

This study examines the sensitivity of future long-term care demand and expenditure estimates to official demographic projections in four selected European countries: Germany, Spain, Italy and the United Kingdom. It uses standardised methodology in the form of a macro-simulation exercise and finds evidence for significant differences in…

A Blended Learning Route to Improving Innovation Education in Europe

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Page, Tom; Thorsteinsson, Gisli

2008-01-01

This paper introduces blended learning as a pedagogical approach, which was explored through the European project InnoEd and the way InnoEd undertook by using the on-line InnoEd VRLE. European educators in the InnoEd project have utilised a range of learning activities to help to improve Innovation Education. A mixture of lectures, visual…

Using Educational Technology to Mediate Informal, Task-Conscious Learning: Design Innovations in Two European Projects

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cook, John

2012-01-01

The purpose of this article is to feature two European projects that have explored innovative approaches to using educational technology to mediate "informal learning" in a variety of contexts. The article is structured as follows: Firstly, it briefly delineates what the author means by "informal learning," opting for the term…

ViPiA: A Project for European Entrepreneurship

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Folinas, Dimitris; Manthou, Vicky; Vlachopoulou, Maro

2006-01-01

The Virtual Pre-Incubator Accelerator (ViPiA) is a two-year project funded by the European Commission. The main goal of the programme is to create a training package for would-be entrepreneurs to assist them in developing their new venture concepts to a level at which they become attractive to potential investors. This paper describes and…

External quality mechanisms for health care: summary of the ExPeRT project on visitatie, accreditation, EFQM and ISO assessment in European Union countries. External Peer Review Techniques. European Foundation for Quality Management. International Organization for Standardization.

PubMed

Shaw, C D

2000-06-01

This paper is a summary of the operation, findings and conclusions of a European Union project on external peer review techniques, termed 'ExPeRT', to research the scope, mechanisms and use of external quality mechanisms in the improvement of health care. Many of the themes outlined are described in detail in other papers that have been prepared specifically for this issue of The International Journal for Quality in Health Care. Although the emphasis of this project and of this issue of the Journal is on Europe, the conclusions are more widely relevant.

A European Languages Virtual Network Proposal

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

García-Peñalvo, Francisco José; González-González, Juan Carlos; Murray, Maria

ELVIN (European Languages Virtual Network) is a European Union (EU) Lifelong Learning Programme Project aimed at creating an informal social network to support and facilitate language learning. The ELVIN project aims to research and develop the connection between social networks, professional profiles and language learning in an informal educational context. At the core of the ELVIN project, there will be a web 2.0 social networking platform that connects employees/students for language practice based on their own professional/academic needs and abilities, using all relevant technologies. The ELVIN remit involves the examination of both methodological and technological issues inherent in achieving a social-based learning platform that provides the user with their own customized Personal Learning Environment for EU language acquisition. ELVIN started in November 2009 and this paper presents the project aims and objectives as well as the development and implementation of the web platform.

EuCARD 2010: European coordination of accelerator research and development

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Romaniuk, Ryszard S.

2010-09-01

Accelerators are basic tools of the experimental physics of elementary particles, nuclear physics, light sources of the fourth generation. They are also used in myriad other applications in research, industry and medicine. For example, there are intensely developed transmutation techniques for nuclear waste from nuclear power and atomic industries. The European Union invests in the development of accelerator infrastructures inside the framework programs to build the European Research Area. The aim is to build new accelerator research infrastructures, develop the existing ones, and generally make the infrastructures more available to competent users. The paper summarizes the first year of activities of the EU FP7 Project Capacities EuCARD -European Coordination of Accelerator R&D. EuCARD is a common venture of 37 European Accelerator Laboratories, Institutes, Universities and Industrial Partners involved in accelerator sciences and technologies. The project, initiated by ESGARD, is an Integrating Activity co-funded by the European Commission under Framework Program 7 - Capacities for a duration of four years, starting April 1st, 2009. Several teams from this country participate actively in this project. The contribution from Polish research teams concerns: photonic and electronic measurement - control systems, RF-gun co-design, thin-film superconducting technology, superconducting transport infrastructures, photon and particle beam measurements and control.

European integration in crisis? Of supranational integration, hegemonic projects and domestic politics

PubMed Central

Bulmer, Simon; Joseph, Jonathan

2015-01-01

The European Union is facing multiple challenges. Departing from mainstream theory, this article adopts a fresh approach to understanding integration. It does so by taking two theoretical steps. The first introduces the structure–agency debate in order to make explicit the relationship between macro-structures, the institutional arrangements at European Union level and agency. The second proposes that the state of integration should be understood as the outcome of contestation between competing hegemonic projects that derive from underlying social processes and that find their primary expression in domestic politics. These two steps facilitate an analysis of the key areas of contestation in the contemporary European Union, illustrated by an exploration of the current crisis in the European Union, and open up the development of an alternative, critical, theory of integration. PMID:29708125

Imaging single cells in a beam of live cyanobacteria with an X-ray laser (CXIDB ID 26)

DOE Data Explorer

Schot, Gijs, vander

2015-02-10

This entry contains ten diffraction patterns, and reconstructions images, of individual living Cyanobium gracile cells, imaged using 517 eV X-rays from the LCLS XFEL. The Hawk software package was used for phasing. The Uppsala aerosol injector was used for sample injection, assuring very low noise levels. The cells come from various stages of the cell cycle, and were imaged in random orientations.

The Challenges of Work-Based Learning in the Changing Context of the European Higher Education Area

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Schmidt, Reinhard; Gibbs, Paul

2009-01-01

This article discusses the key features of the common European framework for work-based learning (WBL) of the "Developing European Work Based Learning Approaches and Methods" (DEWBLAM) project (2003-2006). It examines the context of recent European initiatives and comments on the potential implications for policy, practice and theory,…

Putting Dreyfus into Action: The European Credit Transfer System

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Markowitsch, Jorg; Luomi-Messerer, Karin; Becker, Matthias; Spottl, Georg

2008-01-01

Purpose: The purpose of this article is to look closely at the development of a European Credit Transfer System for Vocational Education and Training (ECVET). The European Commission, together with the member States, are working on it and several pilot projects have been initiated within the Leonardo da Vinci Programme of the European Commission.…

Photovoltaic pilot projects in the European community

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Treble, F. C.; Grassi, G.; Schnell, W.

The paper presents proposals received for the construction of photovoltaic pilot plants as part of the Commission of the European Communities' second 4-year solar energy R and D program. The proposed plants range from 30 to 300 kWp and cover a variety of applications including rural electrification, water pumping, desalination, dairy farming, factories, hospitals, schools and vacation centers. Fifteen projects will be accepted with a total generating capacity of 1 MWp, with preference given to those projects involving the development of new techniques, components and systems.

Fly me to the Sun! ESA inaugurates the European Project on the Sun

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

2000-11-01

In an initiative mounted by ECSITE (European Collaborative for Science, Industry and Technology Exhibitions) with funding from the European Commission and under the supervision, coordination and co-sponsorship of ESA, five teams of youngsters (16-18 years old) from Belgium, France, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands were selected and coordinated by European science museums from each of their countries (Musée des Sciences et des Techniques - Parentville, B; Cité de l'Espace - Toulouse, F; Deutsches Museum - Munich, D; Fondazione IDIS - Naples, I; Foundation Noordwijk Space Expo - Noordwijk, NL). The teams each focused on a theme related to solar research: "How does the Sun work?" (I), "The Sun as a star" (F), "Solar activity" (NL), "Observing the Sun" (D), "Humans and the Sun" (B), and built exhibition "modules" that they will present at the inauguration, in the context of European Science and Technology Week 2000 (6-10 November), promoted by the European Commission. During the two-day event, a jury of representatives of other European science and technology museums, ESA scientists, a science journalist, and two ESA astronauts (Frank de Winne and Andre Kuipers) will judge the youngsters' exhibition modules on the basis of their scientific correctness, their museological value and the commitment shown by the young "communication experts". The winning team will be officially announced on 9 November. The prize is a weekend at the Space Camp in Redu, Belgium. The objective of the European Project on the Sun is educational. It aims, through the direct and "fresh" involvement of youngsters, to heighten European citizens' awareness of space research in general and the Sun's influence on our daily lives in particular. The role of the European Space Agency as reference point in Europe for solar research has been fundamental to the project. From ESA's perspective, EPOS is part of this autumn's wider communication initiative called the Solar Season, which is highlighting ESA's Ulysses, SOHO and Cluster solar missions and their results. These missions are also being presented by ESA at the EPOS exhibition, giving an overview of current European solar science. After its inauguration, the travelling exhibition will move through Europe for the next year, hosted in turn by the five museums that have participated in the project.

Climate Projection Data base for Roads - CliPDaR: Design a guideline for a transnational database of downscaled climate projection data for road impact models - within the Conference's of European Directors of Roads (CEDR) TRANSNATIONAL ROAD RESEARCH PROG

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Matulla, Christoph; Namyslo, Joachim; Fuchs, Tobias; Türk, Konrad

2013-04-01

The European road sector is vulnerable to extreme weather phenomena, which can cause large socio-economic losses. Almost every year there occur several weather triggered events (like heavy precipitation, floods, landslides, high winds, snow and ice, heat or cold waves, etc.), that disrupt transportation, knock out power lines, cut off populated regions from the outside and so on. So, in order to avoid imbalances in the supply of vital goods to people as well as to prevent negative impacts on health and life of people travelling by car it is essential to know present and future threats to roads. Climate change might increase future threats to roads. CliPDaR focuses on parts of the European road network and contributes, based on the current body of knowledge, to the establishment of guidelines helping to decide which methods and scenarios to apply for the estimation of future climate change based challenges in the field of road maintenance. Based on regional scale climate change projections specific road-impact models are applied in order to support protection measures. In recent years, it has been recognised that it is essential to assess the uncertainty and reliability of given climate projections by using ensemble approaches and downscaling methods. A huge amount of scientific work has been done to evaluate these approaches with regard to reliability and usefulness for investigations on possible impacts of climate changes. CliPDaR is going to collect the existing approaches and methodologies in European countries, discuss their differences and - in close cooperation with the road owners - develops a common line on future applications of climate projection data to road impact models. As such, the project will focus on reviewing and assessing existing regional climate change projections regarding transnational highway transport needs. The final project report will include recommendations how the findings of CliPDaR may support the decision processes of European national road administrations regarding possible future climate change impacts. First project results are presented at the conference.

EWork in Europe: The EMERGENCE 18-Country Employer Survey. IES Report 380.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Huws, U.; O'Regan, S.

The EMERGENCE project was conducted to map and measure eWork (the processing of information and transmission of it by means of telecommunications located anywhere in the world) in 18 European countries (15 European Union states plus Hungary, Poland, and the Czech Republic). Data for the project were gathered through a survey of 7,268 employers of…

Engineering Ethics at the Catholic University of Lille (France): Research and Teaching in a European Context.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Didier, Christelle

2000-01-01

Discusses the development of non-technical education and ethics in engineering curricula in Europe and particularly in France. Investigates two projects at the Catholic University of Lille. The first project is an engineering ethics course and the second has to do with writing a European handbook on engineering ethics as a discipline. (Contains 28…

European Symposium for the Evaluation of Innovative Projects To Integrate Disadvantaged Young People into Work (Trier, Germany, March 10-13, 1993).

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Chome, Gesa, Ed.

1993-01-01

Some 180 experts from 10 European countries met at the University of Trier (Germany) to exchange information about youth assistance projects and hear views about the extent of unemployment among disadvantaged youth and development of innovative solutions. "The Failure of Young People to Cope with Life When Unemployed" (Bohnisch) showed…

Prospective Trends in the Socio-Economic Context of Education in European Market Economy Countries.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Weiss, M.; And Others

The purpose of this study was to project and analyze the prospective long-term trends in the socioeconomic context of the educational systems of European market economies and to outline in global terms the probable implication for education and training in the future. Composed of three chapters, the chapter 1 focuses on projected long-term…

NEETs versus EETs: An Observational Study in Italy on the Framework of the HEALTH25 European Project

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Nardi, Bernardo; Lucarelli, Chiara; Talamonti, Marta; Arimatea, Emidio; Fiori, Valentina; Moltedo-Perfetti, Andrès

2015-01-01

An observational study of young Italian NEETs (not in education, employment or training) and their EET peers (in education, employment or training) was conducted in the framework of a European Union (EU) project. Main characteristics and behaviours were compared to gain insights into the NEET condition in Italy. The sample included 111 NEETs…

Obstacles to European research projects with data and tissue: solutions and further challenges.

PubMed

van Veen, Evert-Ben

2008-07-01

Most European biomedical research projects are about data. Research with tissue is about data as well; data will accompany the tissue, and data will be derived from analysing the tissue. Data can be merged with data from various sources, copied and re-analysed in the context of European projects. Privacy enhancing technologies (PET) should be used for transferring data from participating centres to the level where data are being merged. PET provide coding techniques which allow donors to be anonymous and still uniquely discernable. It is defended that under certain conditions two-way coded data can be considered as anonymous data in the sense of the European Data Protection Directive. Divergent interpretations of this Directive and most of all about the concept of coded-anonymous data is one of the main obstacles to observational research in Europe. The Data Protection Authorities will have to relax the extremely high threshold before data cannot be considered personal data anymore. Arguments are given for such relaxation. Besides the logic and logistics of data transfer in European projects, it is also about trust and a realistic risk assessment. In spite of the massive dataflow in European research projects no breach of confidentiality has ever been reported. The ethical rationale of such projects can be based on the principles of citizenship and solidarity provided that certain safeguards are met by which that research will remain observational. However, if the project does not preclude individual feed-back on the outcomes of research, as in theory would be possible with two-way coded tissue, that tissue cannot be considered anonymous. It is argued that in most tissuebanking projects individual feed-back should be excluded. Tissuebanking for research should not turn into medical screening without applying the established criteria for screening to it. If individual feed-back is not foreseen, two-way tissue should be considered anonymous, under the same conditions as two-way coded data. Good research governance is proposed as the way forward in the longer run. Good research governance is about a fair balance between the interests of all stakeholders. It should make the basic principles transparent on which observational research projects are based in line with European solidarity-based healthcare systems. It should encompass principles on how the general results of research will be disseminated, 'conflict of interests' policies, how the issues of intellectual property rights are dealt with, how the confidentiality of personal data of donors is maintained, etc. This should not become an extra bureaucratic layer. A good research governance framework should not establish rules but principles which provide enough flexibility for the specifics of a project, according to the 'comply or explain' principle. Such research governance should be developed bottom-up, by researchers together with the most interested stakeholders, patient organisations. Patients as 'biosocial citizens' are the natural allies of researchers against the 'paternalistic attitudes' of some ethicists and regulators.

Pan European Phenological database (PEP725): a single point of access for European data

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Templ, Barbara; Koch, Elisabeth; Bolmgren, Kjell; Ungersböck, Markus; Paul, Anita; Scheifinger, Helfried; Rutishauser, This; Busto, Montserrat; Chmielewski, Frank-M.; Hájková, Lenka; Hodzić, Sabina; Kaspar, Frank; Pietragalla, Barbara; Romero-Fresneda, Ramiro; Tolvanen, Anne; Vučetič, Višnja; Zimmermann, Kirsten; Zust, Ana

2018-06-01

The Pan European Phenology (PEP) project is a European infrastructure to promote and facilitate phenological research, education, and environmental monitoring. The main objective is to maintain and develop a Pan European Phenological database (PEP725) with an open, unrestricted data access for science and education. PEP725 is the successor of the database developed through the COST action 725 "Establishing a European phenological data platform for climatological applications" working as a single access point for European-wide plant phenological data. So far, 32 European meteorological services and project partners from across Europe have joined and supplied data collected by volunteers from 1868 to the present for the PEP725 database. Most of the partners actively provide data on a regular basis. The database presently holds almost 12 million records, about 46 growing stages and 265 plant species (including cultivars), and can be accessed via http://www.pep725.eu/ . Users of the PEP725 database have studied a diversity of topics ranging from climate change impact, plant physiological question, phenological modeling, and remote sensing of vegetation to ecosystem productivity.

EEC focuses new energy budget on solar and conservation R and D

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Not Available

1979-12-17

Solar energy, followed by conservation and geothermal energy, will have top priority for the European Economic Community's (ECC) $142 million energy research budget through 1983. Proposals for the cost-shared projects, of which EEC will pay half, are being accepted by eligible companies and research organizations. Committees for each technology advise the European Commission on which proposals to accept and suggest an appropriate funding level. The EEC also funds demonstrations of promising research to determine economic feasibility. Major emphasis will be placed during the present four-year budget for solar research on photovoltaics. Other projects include a European solar-insolation atlas and solar-heatingmore » manual, advanced batteries, and energy storage systems. Geothermal projects will focus on resource mapping, exploratory drilling, hydrogen production, and energy forecasting. (DCK)« less

VOXES: a high precision X-ray spectrometer for diffused sources with HAPG crystals in the 2–20 keV range

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Scordo, A.; Curceanu, C.; Miliucci, M.; Shi, H.; Sirghi, F.; Zmeskal, J.

2018-04-01

Bragg spectroscopy is one of the best established experimental methods for high energy resolution X-ray measurements and has been widely used in several fields, going from fundamental physics to quantum mechanics tests, synchrotron radiation and X-FEL applications, astronomy, medicine and industry. However, this technique is limited to the measurement of photons produced from well collimated or point-like sources and becomes quite inefficient for photons coming from extended and diffused sources like those, for example, emitted in the exotic atoms radiative transitions. The VOXES project's goal is to realise a prototype of a high resolution and high precision X-ray spectrometer, using Highly Annealed Pyrolitic Graphite (HAPG) crystals in the Von Hamos configuration, working also for extended sources. The aim is to deliver a cost effective system having an energy resolution at the level of eV for X-ray energies from about 2 keV up to tens of keV, able to perform sub-eV precision measurements with non point-like sources. In this paper, the working principle of VOXES, together with first results, are presented.

Women in EPOS: the role of women in a large pan-European Research Infrastructure for Solid Earth sciences

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Calignano, Elisa; Freda, Carmela; Baracchi, Laura

2017-04-01

Women are outnumbered by men in geosciences senior research positions, but what is the situation if we consider large pan-European Research Infrastructures? With this contribution we want to show an analysis of the role of women in the implementation of the European Plate Observing System (EPOS): a planned research infrastructure for European Solid Earth sciences, integrating national and transnational research infrastructures to enable innovative multidisciplinary research. EPOS involves 256 national research infrastructures, 47 partners (universities and research institutes) from 25 European countries and 4 international organizations. The EPOS integrated platform demands significant coordination between diverse solid Earth disciplinary communities, national research infrastructures and the policies and initiatives they drive, geoscientists and information technologists. The EPOS architecture takes into account governance, legal, financial and technical issues and is designed so that the enterprise works as a single, but distributed, sustainable research infrastructure. A solid management structure is vital for the successful implementation and sustainability of EPOS. The internal organization relies on community-specific Working Packages (WPs), Transversal WPs in charge of the overall EPOS integration and implementation, several governing, executive and advisory bodies, a Project Management Office (PMO) and the Project Coordinator. Driven by the timely debate on gender balance and commitment of the European Commission to promote gender equality in research and innovation, we decided to conduct a mapping exercise on a project that crosses European national borders and that brings together diverse geoscience disciplines under one management structure. We present an analysis of women representation in decision-making positions in each EPOS Working Package (WP Leader, proxy, legal, financial and IT contact persons), in the Boards and Councils and in the PMO, together with statistics on women participation based on the project intranet, which counts more than 500 users. The analysis allows us not only to assess the gender balance in decision-making positions in a pan-European research infrastructure, but also to investigate how women's participation varies with different aspects of the project implementation (management, coordination, legal, financial or technical). Most of the women in EPOS are active geoscientists (academic or in national research institutes), or have a scientific background. By interviewing some of them we report also on how being involved in the project affects their careers. We believe this kind of analysis is an important starting point to promote awareness and achieve gender equality in research and innovation.

Traditional food: a better compatibility with industry requirements.

PubMed

Cotillon, Christophe; Guyot, Anne-Clothilde; Rossi, Daniel; Notarfonso, Maurizio

2013-11-01

The objective of this article is to summarise the main results of the TRUEFOOD Integrated project, which is supported by the European Commission in the European Framework Program 6 (FP6). This project started in 2006 and ended in 2010. TRUEFOOD aimed to improve quality and safety and introduce innovation into Traditional European Food production systems through research, demonstration, dissemination and training activities. It focuses on increasing value to both consumers and producers and on supporting the development of realistic business plans for all components of the food chain, using a farm-to-fork approach. © 2013 Society of Chemical Industry.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Coppens, Philip; Fournier, Bertrand

Here, the need for data-scaling has become increasingly evident as time-resolved pump-probe photocrystallography is rapidly developing at high intensity X-ray sources. Several aspects of the scaling of data sets collected at synchrotrons, XFELs (X-ray Free Electron Lasers) and high-intensity pulsed electron sources are discussed. They include laser-ON/laser-OFF data scaling, inter- and intra-data set scaling. (C) 2015 Author(s). All article content, except where otherwise noted, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.

Guest-tuned spin crossover in flexible supramolecular assemblies templated by a halide (Cl -, Br - or I - )

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Darawsheh, M. D.; Barrios, L. A.; Roubeau, O.

Ligand 1,3-bis(3-(pyridin-2-yl)-1H-pyrazol-5-yl)benzene, L, forms mononuclear spin crossover complexes [FeL 3] 2+ with pendant arms that cause them to dimerize through numerous intermolecular interactions forming supramolecular (X@[FeL 3] 2) 3+ cations. Finally, hey have the flexibility to encapsulate Cl -, Br - or I -, which allow tuning the magnetic properties, in the solid state and in solution.

Guest-tuned spin crossover in flexible supramolecular assemblies templated by a halide (Cl -, Br - or I - )

DOE PAGES

Darawsheh, M. D.; Barrios, L. A.; Roubeau, O.; ...

2016-12-05

Ligand 1,3-bis(3-(pyridin-2-yl)-1H-pyrazol-5-yl)benzene, L, forms mononuclear spin crossover complexes [FeL 3] 2+ with pendant arms that cause them to dimerize through numerous intermolecular interactions forming supramolecular (X@[FeL 3] 2) 3+ cations. Finally, hey have the flexibility to encapsulate Cl -, Br - or I -, which allow tuning the magnetic properties, in the solid state and in solution.

Large-scale atomistic calculations of clusters in intense x-ray pulses

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Ho, Phay J.; Knight, Chris

Here, we present the methodology of our recently developed Monte-Carlo/ Molecular-Dynamics method for studying the fundamental ultrafast dynamics induced by high-fluence, high-intensity x-ray free electron laser (XFEL) pulses in clusters. The quantum nature of the initiating ionization process is accounted for by a Monte Carlo method to calculate probabilities of electronic transitions, including photo absorption, inner-shell relaxation, photon scattering, electron collision and recombination dynamics, and thus track the transient electronic configurations explicitly. The freed electrons and ions are followed by classical particle trajectories using a molecular dynamics algorithm. These calculations reveal the surprising role of electron-ion recombination processes that leadmore » to the development of nonuniform spatial charge density profiles in x-ray excited clusters over femtosecond timescales. In the high-intensity limit, it is important to include the recombination dynamics in the calculated scattering response even for a 2- fs pulse. We also demonstrate that our numerical codes and algorithms can make e!cient use of the computational power of massively parallel supercomputers to investigate the intense-field dynamics in systems with increasing complexity and size at the ultrafast timescale and in non-linear x-ray interaction regimes. In particular, picosecond trajectories of XFEL clusters with attosecond time resolution containing millions of particles can be e!ciently computed on upwards of 262,144 processes.« less

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Weiss, Joel T.; Becker, Julian; Shanks, Katherine S.

There is a compelling need for a high frame rate imaging detector with a wide dynamic range, from single x-rays/pixel/pulse to >10{sup 6} x-rays/pixel/pulse, that is capable of operating at both x-ray free electron laser (XFEL) and 3rd generation sources with sustained fluxes of > 10{sup 11} x-rays/pixel/s [1, 2, 3]. We propose to meet these requirements with the High Dynamic Range Pixel Array Detector (HDR-PAD) by (a) increasing the speed of charge removal strategies [4], (b) increasing integrator range by implementing adaptive gain [5], and (c) exploiting the extended charge collection times of electron-hole pair plasma clouds that formmore » when a sufficiently large number of x-rays are absorbed in a detector sensor in a short period of time [6]. We have developed a measurement platform similar to the one used in [6] to study the effects of high electron-hole densities in silicon sensors using optical lasers to emulate the conditions found at XFELs. Characterizations of the employed tunable wavelength laser with picosecond pulse duration have shown Gaussian focal spots sizes of 6 ± 1 µm rms over the relevant spectrum and 2 to 3 orders of magnitude increase in available intensity compared to previous measurements presented in [6]. Results from measurements on a typical pixelated silicon diode intended for use with the HDR-PAD (150 µm pixel size, 500 µm thick sensor) are presented.« less

Capture and X-ray diffraction studies of protein microcrystals in a microfluidic trap array

DOE PAGES

Lyubimov, Artem Y.; Murray, Thomas D.; Koehl, Antoine; ...

2015-03-27

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) promise to enable the collection of interpretable diffraction data from samples that are refractory to data collection at synchrotron sources. At present, however, more efficient sample-delivery methods that minimize the consumption of microcrystalline material are needed to allow the application of XFEL sources to a wide range of challenging structural targets of biological importance. Here, a microfluidic chip is presented in which microcrystals can be captured at fixed, addressable points in a trap array from a small volume (<10 µl) of a pre-existing slurry grown off-chip. The device can be mounted on a standard goniostat formore » conducting diffraction experiments at room temperature without the need for flash-cooling. Proof-of-principle tests with a model system (hen egg-white lysozyme) demonstrated the high efficiency of the microfluidic approach for crystal harvesting, permitting the collection of sufficient data from only 265 single-crystal still images to permit determination and refinement of the structure of the protein. This work shows that microfluidic capture devices can be readily used to facilitate data collection from protein microcrystals grown in traditional laboratory formats, enabling analysis when cryopreservation is problematic or when only small numbers of crystals are available. Such microfluidic capture devices may also be useful for data collection at synchrotron sources.« less

Advanced diagnosis of the temporal characteristics of ultra-short electron beams

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Otake, Yuji

2011-05-01

Monitoring the temporal structure of an ultra-short electron beam is an indispensable function in order to tune a machine to obtain a highly qualified beam for a recent sophisticated accelerator, such as an X-ray free electron laser (XFEL), and to maintain stable X-ray laser operation. For this purpose, various instruments, such as an HEM11-mode RF beam deflector (RFDEF), a screen monitor (SCM), an electro-optic (EO) sampling method that uses a ZnTe crystal, and a beam position monitor (BPM) have been developed. The SCM that is used to observe the deflected beam image has a position resolution of 2.5 μm, which corresponds to a temporal resolution of 0.5 fs and it is installed at a position 5 m downstream from the RFDEF. The EO sampling method showed the ability to observe an electron bunch length for up to 300 fs (FWHM) at the SCSS test accelerator. The phase reference cavity of the BPM has an additional function of providing beam arrival timing information. A test for the BPM showed temporal fluctuation of 46 fs on the beam arrival timing at the test accelerator. These monitors with high temporal resolutions allow us to achieve the fine beam tuning demanded for the XFEL. The above-mentioned activities are described in this paper as a review article.

Wire position system to consistently measure and record the location change of girders following ground changes

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Choi, H. J.; Lee, S. B.; Lee, H. G.; Y Back, S.; Kim, S. H.; Kang, H. S.

2017-07-01

Several parts that comprise the large scientific device should be installed and operated at the accurate three-dimensional location coordinates (X, Y, and Z) where they should be subjected to survey and alignment. The location of the aligned parts should not be changed in order to ensure that the electron beam parameters (Energy 10 GeV, Charge 200 pC, and Bunch Length 60 fs, Emittance X/Y 0.481 μm/0.256 μm) of PAL-XFEL (X-ray Free Electron Laser of the Pohang Accelerator Laboratory) remain stable and can be operated without any problems. As time goes by, however, the ground goes through uplift and subsidence, which consequently deforms building floors. The deformation of the ground and buildings changes the location of several devices including magnets and RF accelerator tubes, which eventually leads to alignment errors (∆X, ∆Y, and ∆Z). Once alignment errors occur with regard to these parts, the electron beam deviates from its course and beam parameters change accordingly. PAL-XFEL has installed the Hydrostatic Leveling System (HLS) to measure and record the vertical change of buildings and ground consistently and systematically and the Wire Position System (WPS) to measure the two dimensional changes of girders. This paper is designed to introduce the operating principle and design concept of WPS and discuss the current situation regarding installation and operation.

Capture and X-ray diffraction studies of protein microcrystals in a microfluidic trap array

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Lyubimov, Artem Y.; Murray, Thomas D.; Koehl, Antoine

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) promise to enable the collection of interpretable diffraction data from samples that are refractory to data collection at synchrotron sources. At present, however, more efficient sample-delivery methods that minimize the consumption of microcrystalline material are needed to allow the application of XFEL sources to a wide range of challenging structural targets of biological importance. Here, a microfluidic chip is presented in which microcrystals can be captured at fixed, addressable points in a trap array from a small volume (<10 µl) of a pre-existing slurry grown off-chip. The device can be mounted on a standard goniostat formore » conducting diffraction experiments at room temperature without the need for flash-cooling. Proof-of-principle tests with a model system (hen egg-white lysozyme) demonstrated the high efficiency of the microfluidic approach for crystal harvesting, permitting the collection of sufficient data from only 265 single-crystal still images to permit determination and refinement of the structure of the protein. This work shows that microfluidic capture devices can be readily used to facilitate data collection from protein microcrystals grown in traditional laboratory formats, enabling analysis when cryopreservation is problematic or when only small numbers of crystals are available. Such microfluidic capture devices may also be useful for data collection at synchrotron sources.« less

High-yield, ultrafast, surface plasmon-enhanced, Au nanorod optical field electron emitter arrays.

PubMed

Hobbs, Richard G; Yang, Yujia; Fallahi, Arya; Keathley, Philip D; De Leo, Eva; Kärtner, Franz X; Graves, William S; Berggren, Karl K

2014-11-25

Here we demonstrate the design, fabrication, and characterization of ultrafast, surface-plasmon enhanced Au nanorod optical field emitter arrays. We present a quantitative study of electron emission from Au nanorod arrays fabricated by high-resolution electron-beam lithography and excited by 35 fs pulses of 800 nm light. We present accurate models for both the optical field enhancement of Au nanorods within high-density arrays, and electron emission from those nanorods. We have also studied the effects of surface plasmon damping induced by metallic interface layers at the substrate/nanorod interface on near-field enhancement and electron emission. We have identified the peak optical field at which the electron emission mechanism transitions from a 3-photon absorption mechanism to strong-field tunneling emission. Moreover, we have investigated the effects of nanorod array density on nanorod charge yield, including measurement of space-charge effects. The Au nanorod photocathodes presented in this work display 100-1000 times higher conversion efficiency relative to previously reported UV triggered emission from planar Au photocathodes. Consequently, the Au nanorod arrays triggered by ultrafast pulses of 800 nm light in this work may outperform equivalent UV-triggered Au photocathodes, while also offering nanostructuring of the electron pulse produced from such a cathode, which is of interest for X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) development where nanostructured electron pulses may facilitate more efficient and brighter XFEL radiation.

Large-scale atomistic calculations of clusters in intense x-ray pulses

DOE PAGES

Ho, Phay J.; Knight, Chris

2017-04-28

Here, we present the methodology of our recently developed Monte-Carlo/ Molecular-Dynamics method for studying the fundamental ultrafast dynamics induced by high-fluence, high-intensity x-ray free electron laser (XFEL) pulses in clusters. The quantum nature of the initiating ionization process is accounted for by a Monte Carlo method to calculate probabilities of electronic transitions, including photo absorption, inner-shell relaxation, photon scattering, electron collision and recombination dynamics, and thus track the transient electronic configurations explicitly. The freed electrons and ions are followed by classical particle trajectories using a molecular dynamics algorithm. These calculations reveal the surprising role of electron-ion recombination processes that leadmore » to the development of nonuniform spatial charge density profiles in x-ray excited clusters over femtosecond timescales. In the high-intensity limit, it is important to include the recombination dynamics in the calculated scattering response even for a 2- fs pulse. We also demonstrate that our numerical codes and algorithms can make e!cient use of the computational power of massively parallel supercomputers to investigate the intense-field dynamics in systems with increasing complexity and size at the ultrafast timescale and in non-linear x-ray interaction regimes. In particular, picosecond trajectories of XFEL clusters with attosecond time resolution containing millions of particles can be e!ciently computed on upwards of 262,144 processes.« less

A 50-year precipitation analysis over Europe at 5.5km within the UERRA project

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bazile, Eric; Abida, Rachid; Soci, Cornel; Verrelle, Antoine; Szczypta, Camille; Le Moigne, Patrick

2017-04-01

The UERRA project is a 4-year project (2014-2017) financed by the European Union under its 7th Framework Programme SPACE. One of its main objectives is to provide a 50-year reanalysis dataset of surface essential climate variables (ECV) at 5.5km grid at European scale, together with, as much as possible, uncertainty estimates. One of the ECV is the precipitation and this variable is of essential interest in weather forecasting, climate study and to "drive" hydrological model for water management, or agrometeorology. After a brief description of the method used for the precipitation analysis (Soci et al. 2016)during this project, the preliminary results will be presented. The estimation of uncertainties will be also discussed associated with the problem of the evolution of the observation density network and its impact on the long term series. Additional information about the UERRA project can be found at http://www.uerra.eu The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Union, Seventh Framework Programme (FP7-SPACE-2013-1) under grant agreement no 607193.

EMPRESS: A European Project to Enhance Process Control Through Improved Temperature Measurement

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pearce, J. V.; Edler, F.; Elliott, C. J.; Rosso, L.; Sutton, G.; Andreu, A.; Machin, G.

2017-08-01

A new European project called EMPRESS, funded by the EURAMET program `European Metrology Program for Innovation and Research,' is described. The 3 year project, which started in the summer of 2015, is intended to substantially augment the efficiency of high-value manufacturing processes by improving temperature measurement techniques at the point of use. The project consortium has 18 partners and 5 external collaborators, from the metrology sector, high-value manufacturing, sensor manufacturing, and academia. Accurate control of temperature is key to ensuring process efficiency and product consistency and is often not achieved to the level required for modern processes. Enhanced efficiency of processes may take several forms including reduced product rejection/waste; improved energy efficiency; increased intervals between sensor recalibration/maintenance; and increased sensor reliability, i.e., reduced amount of operator intervention. Traceability of temperature measurements to the International Temperature Scale of 1990 (ITS-90) is a critical factor in establishing low measurement uncertainty and reproducible, consistent process control. Introducing such traceability in situ (i.e., within the industrial process) is a theme running through this project.

Project management - challenges in dealing with academic and non-academic partners

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Henkel, Daniela; Eisenhauer, Anton; Drossou-Berendes, Alexandra

2016-04-01

Modern research projects on national, European and international level are challenged by an increasing requirement of inter and trans-disciplinarily, societal relevance and educational outreach as well as market oriented applications. In particular, to be successful in European research in the frame of HORIZON 2020, the EU Framework Programme for Research and Innovation, it is crucial that relatively large international research consortia involve academic and non-academic partners, NGOs, private and non-private institutions as well as industrial companies. For the management and organisation of such consortia coordinators have to deal with significant differences between multi-national and multi-sectorial administrations and research environments, in order to secure a successful implementation of the project. This often costs research and non-academic partners tremendous efforts, not to say excessive demands. Based on the experiences made in the frame of an Innovative Training Network (ITN) project within the HORIZON 2020 Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions, this presentation identifies organisational pitfalls and major challenges of the project management for European funded research involving multi-national academic and non-academic research partners. Possible strategies are discussed to circumvent and avoid conflicts already at the beginning of the project.

A data protection framework for trans-European genetic research projects.

PubMed

Claerhout, Brecht; Forgó, Nikolaus; Krügel, Tina; Arning, Marian; De Moor, Georges

2008-01-01

The paper proposes a data protection framework for trans-European medical research projects, which is based on a technical security infrastructure as well as on organizational measures and contractual obligations. It mainly relies on pseudonymization, an internal Data Protection Authority and on a Trusted Third Party. The outcome is an environment that combines both good research conditions and an extensive protection of patients' privacy.

Implementing History and Philosophy in Science Teaching: Strategies, Methods, Results and Experiences from the European HIPST Project

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hottecke, Dietmar; Henke, Andreas; Riess, Falk

2012-01-01

This paper presents a rationale for utilizing HPS to teach physics and the NoS developed in the course of a project funded by the European Union. A core feature of this approach is formed by the development of historical case studies for the use in lessons. Furthermore, the learners' perspectives are explicitly taken into account. Teaching methods…

Tilling the Soil of the European Higher Education Area

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Burnett, John

2007-01-01

The Bologna Process presents both opportunities and challenges for teachers in the European area. As tensions surface between different forms of national legislation, accreditation and quality assurance, projects need to be developed that model ways of resolving problems within a European context. Utilising their links and network of contacts…

Accreditation of Engineering Programmes: European Perspectives and Challenges in a Global Context

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Augusti, Giuliano

2007-01-01

The EUR-ACE Socrates-Tempus project (September 2004/March 2006) proposed a decentralized European system for accreditation of engineering programmes in the "Bologna process" area (European Higher Education Area) at the First and Second Cycle (FC and SC) level (but including "Integrated Programmes", i.e. programmes leading…

Lifelong Learning: Conceptualizations in European Educational Policy Documents

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Alves, Mariana Gaio; Neves, Claudia; Gomes, Elisabete Xavier

2010-01-01

Over recent years, lifelong learning has been a central and guiding principle in the formulation of European educational policies. Within this general framework, the authors have been developing a research project that allows them to approach the theme of lifelong learning and European educational policies, taking into account four levels of…

Creating a Common Grammar for European Higher Education Governance

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Magalhaes, Antonio; Veiga, Amelia; Ribeiro, Filipa M.; Sousa, Sofia; Santiago, Rui

2013-01-01

This paper addresses the interaction between European Union policies and national higher education sectors in the countries involved in the TRUE project (England, France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, Norway, Portugal and Switzerland) making the case for European governance. Relevant for this matter is the role of political processes that…

The European Clinical Specialization on Fluency Disorders (ECSF)

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Eggers, Kurt; Leahy, Margaret

2011-01-01

The European Clinical Specialization on Fluency Disorders (ECSF) project consists of one-year post-qualification fluency specialization training and a harmonized graduate fluency program. It was developed by eight European universities/colleges to provide the means whereby graduates would meet comparable standards of competence to practice in the…

How Green Are European Curricula? A Comparative Analysis of Primary School Syllabi in Five European Countries

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hanish, Anna; Rank, Astrid; Seeber, Gunther

2014-01-01

The authors conducted a cross-national curriculum analysis as part of a European Union Comenius project regarding the implementation of an online tool to foster environmental education (EE) in primary schools. The overall goal was to determine the extent and intensity that EE is embedded in the syllabi of five European countries. To this end, the…

Projections on the number of individuals with atrial fibrillation in the European Union, from 2000 to 2060

PubMed Central

Krijthe, Bouwe P.; Kunst, Anton; Benjamin, Emelia J.; Lip, Gregory Y.H.; Franco, Oscar H.; Hofman, Albert; Witteman, Jacqueline C.M.; Stricker, Bruno H.; Heeringa, Jan

2013-01-01

Aims Since atrial fibrillation (AF) is associated with increased risks of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular complications, estimations on the number of individuals with AF are relevant to healthcare planning. We aimed to project the number of individuals with AF in the Netherlands and in the European Union from 2000 to 2060. Methods and results Age- and sex-specific AF prevalence estimates were obtained from the prospective community-based Rotterdam Study. Population projections for the Netherlands and the European Union were obtained from the European Union's statistics office. In the age stratum of 55–59 years, the prevalence of AF was 1.3% in men (95% CI: 0.4–3.6%) and 1.7% in women (95% CI: 0.7–4.0%). The prevalence of AF increased to 24.2% in men (95% CI: 18.5–30.7%), and 16.1% in women (95% CI: 13.1–19.4%), for those >85 years of age. This age- and sex-specific prevalence remained stable during the years of follow-up. Furthermore, we estimate that in the European Union, 8.8 million adults over 55 years had AF in 2010 (95% CI: 6.5–12.3 million). We project that this number will double by 2060 to 17.9 million (95% CI: 13.6–23.7 million) if the age- and sex-specific prevalence remains stable. Conclusion We estimate that from 2010 to 2060, the number of adults 55 years and over with AF in the European Union will more than double. As AF is associated with significant morbidities and mortality, this increasing number of individuals with AF may have major public health implications. PMID:23900699

Projections on the number of individuals with atrial fibrillation in the European Union, from 2000 to 2060.

PubMed

Krijthe, Bouwe P; Kunst, Anton; Benjamin, Emelia J; Lip, Gregory Y H; Franco, Oscar H; Hofman, Albert; Witteman, Jacqueline C M; Stricker, Bruno H; Heeringa, Jan

2013-09-01

Since atrial fibrillation (AF) is associated with increased risks of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular complications, estimations on the number of individuals with AF are relevant to healthcare planning. We aimed to project the number of individuals with AF in the Netherlands and in the European Union from 2000 to 2060. Age- and sex-specific AF prevalence estimates were obtained from the prospective community-based Rotterdam Study. Population projections for the Netherlands and the European Union were obtained from the European Union's statistics office. In the age stratum of 55-59 years, the prevalence of AF was 1.3% in men (95% CI: 0.4-3.6%) and 1.7% in women (95% CI: 0.7-4.0%). The prevalence of AF increased to 24.2% in men (95% CI: 18.5-30.7%), and 16.1% in women (95% CI: 13.1-19.4%), for those >85 years of age. This age- and sex-specific prevalence remained stable during the years of follow-up. Furthermore, we estimate that in the European Union, 8.8 million adults over 55 years had AF in 2010 (95% CI: 6.5-12.3 million). We project that this number will double by 2060 to 17.9 million (95% CI: 13.6-23.7 million) if the age- and sex-specific prevalence remains stable. We estimate that from 2010 to 2060, the number of adults 55 years and over with AF in the European Union will more than double. As AF is associated with significant morbidities and mortality, this increasing number of individuals with AF may have major public health implications.

Management of pancreatic trauma: a literature review.

PubMed

Papalois, Vassilios

2017-03-01

The European Union of Medical Specialists, founded in 1958, is the largest and oldest european medical organization. It includes 39 member states (of the European Union and others), and represents a total of 1.600.000 medical specialists. The main objective of the UEMS is to influence european healthcare politics by promoting the interests of the european medical specialists, establishing high standards in practice and training, as well as continuing medical education and professional development, and guaranteeing quality in specialist practice. The UEMS is developing several projects to face current and future challenges related to surgical training, education, acreditation, revalidation and professional development: i.- First, the UEMS is developing homogeneous requisites for European Training (ETRs), ii.- To manage the quality control process of the ETRs and evaluation of the organization, the UEMS has created the Council of european specialized medial evaluations (CESMA), iii.- The UEMS has been greatly involved in the acreditation process of training centres in all of Europe, iv.- in relation to continuing medical education, the European Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (EACCME) is the main project of the UEMS for the accreditation of educational events and v.- the UEMS has established the Network of Accredited Clinical Skills Centres of Europe (UEMS-NASCE), that facilitates the accreditation and cooperation of training centres in Europe. In conclusion, with the great support of National Surgical Societies of the UEMS and the Surgery Section a series of solid projects have been established to support the professional development of the collective in Europe. This process constitutes a continuous effort that is very gratifying, with the aim to set the standards for a brilliant future for surgery students and specialized surgeons. Copyright © 2017. Publicado por Elsevier España, S.L.U.

ENLIGHT: European network for Light ion hadron therapy.

PubMed

Dosanjh, Manjit; Amaldi, Ugo; Mayer, Ramona; Poetter, Richard

2018-04-03

The European Network for Light Ion Hadron Therapy (ENLIGHT) was established in 2002 following various European particle therapy network initiatives during the 1980s and 1990s (e.g. EORTC task group, EULIMA/PIMMS accelerator design). ENLIGHT started its work on major topics related to hadron therapy (HT), such as patient selection, clinical trials, technology, radiobiology, imaging and health economics. It was initiated through CERN and ESTRO and dealt with various disciplines such as (medical) physics and engineering, radiation biology and radiation oncology. ENLIGHT was funded until 2005 through the EC FP5 programme. A regular annual meeting structure was started in 2002 and continues until today bringing together the various disciplines and projects and institutions in the field of HT at different European places for regular exchange of information on best practices and research and development. Starting in 2006 ENLIGHT coordination was continued through CERN in collaboration with ESTRO and other partners involved in HT. Major projects within the EC FP7 programme (2008-2014) were launched for R&D and transnational access (ULICE, ENVISION) and education and training networks (Marie Curie ITNs: PARTNER, ENTERVISION). These projects were instrumental for the strengthening of the field of hadron therapy. With the start of 4 European carbon ion and proton centres and the upcoming numerous European proton therapy centres, the future scope of ENLIGHT will focus on strengthening current and developing European particle therapy research, multidisciplinary education and training and general R&D in technology and biology with annual meetings and a continuously strong CERN support. Collaboration with the European Particle Therapy Network (EPTN) and other similar networks will be pursued. Copyright © 2018 CERN. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

The role of the International Classification of Functioning, Disability, and Health and quality criteria for improving assistive technology service delivery in Europe.

PubMed

Steel, Emily J; Gelderblom, Gert Jan; de Witte, Luc P

2012-02-01

People with disabilities are entitled to access assistive technology (AT) to facilitate their full and effective participation in society and may reasonably expect to be central to the decision-making processes of services that provide these technologies. European projects have improved the knowledge and resources available for AT service delivery in many countries, but the outputs are not consistently implemented or published in scientific literature. This article examines European developments in AT service delivery and the barriers to its effective provision. Specifically, it analyzes the role of the International Classification of Functioning, Disability, and Health in service delivery improvement. Published scientific papers, as well as reports from and descriptions of European projects related to AT service delivery, were reviewed. The publications were analyzed in relation to six criteria for AT service delivery described in an earlier, major European project. The findings and recommendations from the publications are synthesized in this article to identify advances and gaps in AT service delivery and to assess the current status and direction of AT service delivery improvement in Europe. Multicountry projects have brought together AT researchers from across Europe to work together and produced promising results that are contextually relevant. Access to AT information and training of practitioners has improved, and efforts are being made to facilitate user involvement. More effort should be put into integrating research and resources from European projects into practice. Use of the International Classification of Functioning, Disability, and Health model and terminology may support coordination of service delivery systems. The AT research and practice communities in Europe may be able to learn from developments in North America, while continuing to work together, sharing resources and strategies, and communicating results internationally.

Organ Donation European Quality System: ODEQUS project methodology.

PubMed

Manyalich, M; Guasch, X; Gomez, M P; Páez, G; Teixeira, L

2013-01-01

Differences in the number of organ donors among hospitals cannot be explained only by the number of intensive care unit beds used or neurologic patients treated. The figures obtained are influenced by the organizational structure of the donation process and how efficient it is. The Organ Donation European Quality System (ODEQUS) is a 3-year project (from October 2010 to September 2013) co-financed by the European Agency for Health and Consumers (EAHC20091108) which aims to define a methodology to evaluate organ procurement performance at the hospital level. ODEQUS's specific objectives are to identify quality criteria and to develop quality indicators in three types of organ donation (after brain death, after cardiac death, and living donation). Those tools will be useful for hospitals' self-assessment as well as for developing an international auditing model. A consortium has been established involving 14 associated partners from Austria, Croatia, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom, as well as five collaborating partners from Greece, Hungary, Malta, Slovenia, and Turkey. The project has been established in three steps: 1) Design of a survey about the use of quality tools in a wide sample of European hospitals; 2) Development of quality criteria and quality indicators by the project experts. The main fields considered have been organizational structures, clinical procedures, and outcomes; and 3) Elaboration of an evaluation system to test the quality indicators in 11 European hospitals. Two types of training have been designed and performed: one concerns the development of quality criteria and quality indicators, whereas another is focused on how to use evaluation tools. Following this methodology, the project has so far identified 131 quality criteria and developed 31 quality indicators. Currently, the quality indicators are being tested in 11 selected hospitals. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Godiva, a European Project for Ozone and Trace Gas Measurements from GOME

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Goede, A. P. H.; Tanzi, C. P.; Aben, I.; Burrows, J. P.; Weber, M.; Perner, D.; Monks, P. S.; Llewellyn-Jones, D.; Corlett, G. K.; Arlander, D. W.; Platt, U.; Wagner, T.; Pfeilsticker, K.; Taalas, P.; Kelder, H.; Piters, A.

GODIVA (GOME Data Interpretation, Validation and Application) is a European Commission project aimed at the improvement of GOME (Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment) data products. Existing data products include global ozone, NO2 columns and (ir)radiances. Advanced data products include O3 profiles, BrO, HCHO and OCIO columns. These data are validated by ground-based and balloon borne instruments. Calibration issues are investigated by in-flight monitoring using several complementary calibration sources, as well as an on-ground replica of the GOME instrument. The results will lead to specification of operational processing of the EUMETSAT ozone Satellite Application Facility as well as implementation of the improved and new GOME data products in the NILU database for use in the European THESEO (Third European Stratospheric Experiment on Ozone) campaign of 1999

European seismological data exchange, access and processing: current status of the Research Infrastructure project NERIES

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Giardini, D.; van Eck, T.; Bossu, R.; Wiemer, S.

2009-04-01

The EC Research infrastructure project NERIES, an Integrated Infrastructure Initiative in seismology for 2006-2010 has passed its mid-term point. We will present a short concise overview of the current state of the project, established cooperation with other European and global projects and the planning for the last year of the project. Earthquake data archiving and access within Europe has dramatically improved during the last two years. This concerns earthquake parameters, digital broadband and acceleration waveforms and historical data. The Virtual European Broadband Seismic Network (VEBSN) consists currently of more then 300 stations. A new distributed data archive concept, the European Integrated Waveform Data Archive (EIDA), has been implemented in Europe connecting the larger European seismological waveform data. Global standards for earthquake parameter data (QuakeML) and tomography models have been developed and are being established. Web application technology has been and is being developed to make a jump start to the next generation data services. A NERIES data portal provides a number of services testing the potential capacities of new open-source web technologies. Data application tools like shakemaps, lossmaps, site response estimation and tools for data processing and visualisation are currently available, although some of these tools are still in an alpha version. A European tomography reference model will be discussed at a special workshop in June 2009. Shakemaps, coherent with the NEIC application, are implemented in, among others, Turkey, Italy, Romania, Switzerland, several countries. The comprehensive site response software is being distributed and used both inside and outside the project. NERIES organises several workshops inviting both consortium and non-consortium participants and covering a wide range of subjects: ‘Seismological observatory operation tools', ‘Tomography', ‘Ocean bottom observatories', 'Site response software training', ‘Historical earthquake catalogues', ‘Distribution of acceleration data', etc. Some of these workshops are coordinated with other organisations/projects, like ORFEUS, ESONET, IRIS, etc. NERIES still offers grants to individual researchers or groups to work at facilities such as the Swiss national seismological network (SED/ETHZ, Switzerland), the CEA/DASE facilities in France, the data scanning facilities at INGV (SISMOS), the array facilities of NORSAR (Norway) and the new Conrad Facility in Austria.

ALARA in European nuclear installations

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Lefaure, C.; Croft, J.; Pfeffer, W.

1995-03-01

For over a decade the Commission of the European Community has sponsored research projects on the development and practical implementation of the Optimization principle, or as it is often referred to, ALARA. These projects have given rise to a series of successful international Optimization training courses and have provided a significant input to the periodic European Seminars on Optimization, the last one of which took place in April 1993. This paper reviews the approaches to Optimization that have development within Europe and describes the areas of work in the current project. The on-going CEC research project addresses the problem ofmore » ALARA and internal exposures, and tries to define procedures for ALARA implementation, taking account of the perception of the hazard as well as the levels of probability of exposure. The relationships between ALARA and work management, and ALARA and decommissioning of installations appear to be other fruitful research areas. Finally, this paper introduces some software for using ALARA decision aiding techniques and databases containing feed back experience developed in Europe.« less

Virtual Power Electronics: Novel Software Tools for Design, Modeling and Education

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hamar, Janos; Nagy, István; Funato, Hirohito; Ogasawara, Satoshi; Dranga, Octavian; Nishida, Yasuyuki

The current paper is dedicated to present browser-based multimedia-rich software tools and e-learning curriculum to support the design and modeling process of power electronics circuits and to explain sometimes rather sophisticated phenomena. Two projects will be discussed. The so-called Inetele project is financed by the Leonardo da Vinci program of the European Union (EU). It is a collaborative project between numerous EU universities and institutes to develop state-of-the art curriculum in Electrical Engineering. Another cooperative project with participation of Japanese, European and Australian institutes focuses especially on developing e-learning curriculum, interactive design and modeling tools, furthermore on development of a virtual laboratory. Snapshots from these two projects will be presented.

Introduction to the Science Teacher Training in an Information Society (STTIS) project

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pinto, Roser

2002-03-01

The cluster of papers in this Special Issue, contains some results from the Science Teacher Training in an Information Society (STTIS) project, which was funded by the European Commission. Five European universities were involved: Universite´ Denis Diderot-Paris 7 (France), Universita¤ 'Federico II da Napoli' (Italy), University of Oslo (Norway), Universitat Auto¤noma de Barcelona (Spain), and the University of Sussex (UK). The names of those involved are given in the Appendix. The following brief description of the aims and structure of the project sets the work reported here (in this cluster) in the context of the whole project. The project dealt with general questions and challenges that the Information Society poses to science educators.

EU FP7 project 'CAMbrella' to build European research network for complementary and alternative medicine.

PubMed

Weidenhammer, Wolfgang; Lewith, George; Falkenberg, Torkel; Fønnebø, Vinjar; Johannessen, Helle; Reiter, Bettina; Uehleke, Bernhard; von Ammon, Klaus; Baumhöfener, Franziska; Brinkhaus, Benno

2011-01-01

The status of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) within the EU needs clarification. The definition and terminology of CAM is heterogeneous. The therapies, legal status, regulations and approaches used vary from country to country but there is widespread use by EU citizens. A coordination project funded by the EU has been launched to improve the knowledge about CAM in Europe. The project aims to evaluate the conditions surrounding CAM use and provision in Europe and to develop a roadmap for European CAM research. Specific objectives are to establish an EU network involving centres of research excellence for collaborative projects, to develop consensus-based terminology to describe CAM interventions, to create a knowledge base that facilitates the understanding of patient demand for CAM and its prevalence, to review the current legal status and policies governing CAM provision, and to explore the needs and attitudes of EU citizens with respect to CAM. Based on this information a roadmap will be created that will enable sustainable and prioritised future European research in CAM. CAMbrella encompasses 16 academic research groups from 12 European countries and will run for 36 months starting from January 2010. The project will be delivered in 9 work packages coordinated by a Management Board and directed by a Scientific Steering Committee with support of an Advisory Board. The outcomes generated will be disseminated through the project's website, peer review open access publications and a final conference, with emphasis on current and future EU policies, addressing different target audiences. Copyright © 2011 S. Karger AG, Basel.

ReProTool Version 2.0: Re-Engineering Academic Curriculum Using Learning Outcomes, ECTS and Bologna Process Concepts

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Pouyioutas, Philippos; Gjermundrod, Harald; Dionysiou, Ioanna

2012-01-01

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to present ReProTool Version 2.0, a software tool that is used for the European Credit Transfer System (ECTS) and the Bologna Process re-engineering of academic programmes. The tool is the result of an 18 months project (February 2012-July 2013) project, co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund…

Example of International Co-Operation in the Frame of the Project Phare (TEMPUS) in Innovations in Teaching of Environmental Hydrogeology in Engineering Education in the Czech Republic.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Grmela, Arnost; Rapantova, Nadia

The international TEMPUS (Trans-European Co-operating and Mobility Scheme for Higher Education between Central/Eastern Europe and European Union) project lasted from 1995-1997. In the framework of TEMPUS, a material and knowledge background was developed in order to ensure the education of the branch Geological Engineering with specialization in…

Scenarios and Strategies for Vocational Education and Lifelong Learning in Europe: Summary of Findings and Conclusions of the Joint CEDEFOP/ETF Project (1998-2002). CEDEFOP Panorama Series.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sellin, Burkart

The scenarios project set out to develop a tool to improve understanding of vocational education and training (VET) systems in the linked contexts of economic and technological change; changes in society, work, and the labor market; and changing training/skills environment. Other key attempts at the European level to generate European scenarios…

Developing, evaluating and implementing alcohol brief interventions in Europe.

PubMed

Heather, Nick

2011-03-01

This article traces the history of research on the development, evaluation and implementation of alcohol brief intervention (BI) in Europe. Narrative and historical review. BI originated in Europe and, following a definition of opportunistic BI, early pioneering studies are summarised. The role of European scientists in the series of studies making up the WHO Collaborative Project on Detection and Management of Alcohol-related Problems in Primary Health Care (1982-2006) is then described, followed by a short account of a current EU-funded project (Primary Health European Project on Alcohol) with the aim of achieving a widespread, routine and enduring implementation of BI in EU member states. In addition to involvement in these two major projects, a great deal of research on BI has been carried out in a range of European countries and some of this research is noted. Several European governments are now taking the rolling out of BI in routine services very seriously as a policy measure. There is no necessary conflict between widely available BI and alcohol control measures. While much remains to be done regarding practical implementation, the mood of those interested in the promotion of BI as a means of reducing alcohol-related harm, in Europe as elsewhere, is cautiously optimistic. © 2011 Australasian Professional Society on Alcohol and other Drugs.

Impact of early diagnosis and control of chronic respiratory diseases on active and healthy ageing. A debate at the European Union Parliament.

PubMed

Bousquet, J; Tanasescu, C C; Camuzat, T; Anto, J M; Blasi, F; Neou, A; Palkonen, S; Papadopoulos, N G; Antunes, J P; Samolinski, B; Yiallouros, P; Zuberbier, T

2013-01-01

A debate at the European Union Parliament was held on 13 November 2012 on the Impact of early diagnosis and control of chronic respiratory diseases on Active and Healthy Ageing (AHA). The debate was held under the auspices of the Cyprus Presidency of the European Union (2012) and represents a follow-up of the priorities of the Polish Presidency of the European Union (2011). It highlighted the importance of early life events on the occurrence of chronic respiratory diseases later in life and their impact on active and healthy ageing. Epidemiologic evidence was followed by actions that should be taken to prevent and manage chronic respiratory diseases in children. The debate ended by practical, feasible and achievable projects, demonstrating the strength of the political action in the field. Three projects will be initiated from this debate: The first will be a meeting sponsored by the Région Languedoc-Roussillon on the developmental origins of chronic diseases and ageing: from research to policies and value creation. The second project is being led by the WHO Collaborating Centre for Asthma and Rhinitis: Prevention of Asthma, Prevention of Allergy (PAPA). The third project is the GA(2)LEN sentinel network. © 2013 John Wiley & Sons A/S. Published by Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

European virtual campus for biomedical engineering EVICAB.

PubMed

Malmivuo, Jaakko A; Nousiainen, Juha O; Lindroos, Kari V

2007-01-01

European Commission has funded building a curriculum on Biomedical Engineering to the Internet for European universities under the project EVICAB. EVICAB forms a curriculum which will be free access and available free of charge. Therefore, in addition to the European universities, it will be available worldwide. EVICAB will make high quality education available for everyone, not only for the university students, and facilitate the development of the discipline of Biomedical Engineering.

[Counterfeit Medicines in Internet and the Fakeshare European Project: Experiences and Activities in Spain].

PubMed

Catalán-Matamoros, Daniel; González-Ochando, Nuria; Pecharroman-Arribas, Henar; Fernández-Muelas, Ana; Bentolila-Benchimol, Stella Sandra; IbarraLorente, Manuel

2016-08-16

The illicit trafficking of medicines over the Internet is a growing problem that affects public health. Since 2013, the Spanish Agency of Medicines and Medical Devices (AEMPS) participates in the European project Fakeshare, co-funded by the European Commission and coordinated by the Italian Medicines Agency (Agenzia Italiana del Farmaco, AIFA). This project aims to coordinate initiatives against the illegal supply of medicines, including from purchases through websites engaged in illegal activity, to thefts and other diversions of medicines to the illicit trafficking.This paper presents the activities in that area as well as strategies and elaborated materials at the national level. The keys to fight or face the illegal sale of medicines over the internet are coordinated cooperation with all the stakeholders, development of communication campaigns to raise awareness and sensitize consumers, health professionals and industry organizations about the risks of buying medicines on illegal websites, creating databases to share information on thefts and other deviations to the illegal market and disseminate national practices to combat illicit medicines trafficking at European and international levels.

The IMI PROTECT project: purpose, organizational structure, and procedures.

PubMed

Reynolds, Robert F; Kurz, Xavier; de Groot, Mark C H; Schlienger, Raymond G; Grimaldi-Bensouda, Lamiae; Tcherny-Lessenot, Stephanie; Klungel, Olaf H

2016-03-01

The Pharmacoepidemiological Research on Outcomes of Therapeutics by a European ConsorTium (PROTECT) initiative was a collaborative European project that sought to address limitations of current methods in the field of pharmacoepidemiology and pharmacovigilance. Initiated in 2009 and ending in 2015, PROTECT was part of the Innovative Medicines Initiative, a joint undertaking by the European Union and pharmaceutical industry. Thirty-five partners including academics, regulators, small and medium enterprises, and European Federation of Pharmaceuticals Industries and Associations companies contributed to PROTECT. Two work packages within PROTECT implemented research examining the extent to which differences in the study design, methodology, and choice of data source can contribute to producing discrepant results from observational studies on drug safety. To evaluate the effect of these differences, the project applied different designs and analytic methodology for six drug-adverse event pairs across several electronic healthcare databases and registries. This papers introduces the organizational structure and procedures of PROTECT, including how drug-adverse event and data sources were selected, study design and analyses documents were developed, and results managed centrally. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

TELRI: Trans European Language Resources Infrastructure Newsletter, 1995-1997.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

TELRI: Trans European Language Resources Infrastructure Newsletter, 1997

1997-01-01

The first seven issues of the Trans European Language Resources Infrastructure (TELRI) newsletter, a publication of the COPERNICUS project funded by the Commission of the European Communities, date from September 1995 to October 1997. The first three issues contain articles in the origins of TELRI, its members, working groups, and events. TELRI's…

Towards European Citizenship through Higher Education?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Fernndez, Scar

2005-01-01

The purpose of this study, the first part of a recently concluded project, is to describe and analyse the perceptions that European university students have of European citizenship and to offer some insight into the term. Before describing our findings, we offer a brief review of the concept of citizenship, attempting to define it in the European…

Benchmarking in European Higher Education: A Step beyond Current Quality Models

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Burquel, Nadine; van Vught, Frans

2010-01-01

This paper presents the findings of a two-year EU-funded project (DG Education and Culture) "Benchmarking in European Higher Education", carried out from 2006 to 2008 by a consortium led by the European Centre for Strategic Management of Universities (ESMU), with the Centre for Higher Education Development, UNESCO-CEPES, and the…

Teenagers and young adults with cancer in Europe: from national programmes to a European integrated coordinated project.

PubMed

Stark, D; Bielack, S; Brugieres, L; Dirksen, U; Duarte, X; Dunn, S; Erdelyi, D J; Grew, T; Hjorth, L; Jazbec, J; Kabickova, E; Konsoulova, A; Kowalczyk, J R; Lassaletta, A; Laurence, V; Lewis, I; Monrabal, A; Morgan, S; Mountzios, G; Olsen, P R; Renard, M; Saeter, G; van der Graaf, W T; Ferrari, A

2016-05-01

Over 14 000 patients aged 15-24 are estimated to be diagnosed with cancer in the European Union (EU) each year. Teenagers and young adults (TYA) often fall down gaps between children's and adults cancer services. The specific challenges of providing optimal care to them are described, but we present a summary of recent progress. Progress to overcome these challenges is happening at different rates across Europe. We summarise the European national projects in this field but more recently we have seen the beginnings of European coordination. Within the EU 7th Funding Programme (FP7) European Network for Cancer Research in Children and Adolescents programme (ENCCA), a specific European Network for Teenagers and Young Adults with Cancer has held a series of scientific meetings, including professionals, patients and caregivers. This group has proposed unanswered research questions and agreed key features of a high-quality service that can improve outcomes for TYA with cancer, including the primacy of collaboration between adult and paediatric services to eliminate the gap in the management of TYA with cancer. © 2015 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Euro-VO-Coordination of virtual observatory activities in Europe

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Genova, Françoise; Allen, Mark G.; Arviset, Christophe; Lawrence, Andy; Pasian, Fabio; Solano, Enrique; Wambsganss, Joachim

2015-06-01

The European Virtual Observatory Euro-VO has been coordinating European VO activities through a series of projects co-funded by the European Commission over the last 15 years. The bulk of VO work in Europe is ensured by the national VO initiatives and those of intergovernmental agencies. VO activities at the European level coordinate the work in support of the three "pillars" of the Virtual Observatory: support to the scientific community, take-up by the data providers, and technological activities. Several Euro-VO projects have also provided direct support to selected developments and prototyping. This paper explains the methodology used by Euro-VO over the years. It summarises the activities which were performed and their evolutions at different stages of the development of the VO, explains the Euro-VO role with respect to the international and national levels of VO activities, details the lessons learnt for best practices for the coordination of the VO building blocks, and the liaison with other European initiatives, documenting the added-value of European coordination. Finally, the current status and next steps of Euro-VO are briefly addressed.

[A network of LIFE projects to promote the transfer and exchange of knowledge on environment and health].

PubMed

Cori, Liliana; Carducci, Annalaura; Donzelli, Gabriele; La Rocca, Cinzia; Bianchi, Fabrizio

2018-01-01

Eleven projects within the LIFE programme (through which the Directorate-General for Environment of the European Commission provides funding for projects aim at protecting environment and nature) addressing environmental-health-related issues have been involved in a collaborative network called KTE LIFE EnvHealth Network. The shared issues tackled by that projects are knowledge transfer and exchange (KTE). The objective of the LIFE programme is to support the implementation of the environmental legislation in the European Union, to provide new tools and knowledge that will help to better protect both the territory and the communities. Transferring knowledge to decision makers, at the appropriate and effective level, is therefore a central function of the projects. The Network promotes national and international networking, which intends to involve other projects, to provide methodological support, to make information and successful practices circulate, with the aim of multiplying the energies of each project involved.

Accurate macromolecular structures using minimal measurements from X-ray free-electron lasers

PubMed Central

Hattne, Johan; Echols, Nathaniel; Tran, Rosalie; Kern, Jan; Gildea, Richard J.; Brewster, Aaron S.; Alonso-Mori, Roberto; Glöckner, Carina; Hellmich, Julia; Laksmono, Hartawan; Sierra, Raymond G.; Lassalle-Kaiser, Benedikt; Lampe, Alyssa; Han, Guangye; Gul, Sheraz; DiFiore, Dörte; Milathianaki, Despina; Fry, Alan R.; Miahnahri, Alan; White, William E.; Schafer, Donald W.; Seibert, M. Marvin; Koglin, Jason E.; Sokaras, Dimosthenis; Weng, Tsu-Chien; Sellberg, Jonas; Latimer, Matthew J.; Glatzel, Pieter; Zwart, Petrus H.; Grosse-Kunstleve, Ralf W.; Bogan, Michael J.; Messerschmidt, Marc; Williams, Garth J.; Boutet, Sébastien; Messinger, Johannes; Zouni, Athina; Yano, Junko; Bergmann, Uwe; Yachandra, Vittal K.; Adams, Paul D.; Sauter, Nicholas K.

2014-01-01

X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) sources enable the use of crystallography to solve three-dimensional macromolecular structures under native conditions and free from radiation damage. Results to date, however, have been limited by the challenge of deriving accurate Bragg intensities from a heterogeneous population of microcrystals, while at the same time modeling the X-ray spectrum and detector geometry. Here we present a computational approach designed to extract statistically significant high-resolution signals from fewer diffraction measurements. PMID:24633409

The 16th International Conference on X-ray Absorption Fine Structure (XAFS16)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Grunwaldt, J.-D.; Hagelstein, M.; Rothe, J.

2016-05-01

This preface of the proceedings volume of the 16th International Conference on X- ray Absorption Fine Structure (XAFS16) gives a glance on the five days of cutting-edge X-ray science which were held in Karlsruhe, Germany, August 23 - 28, 2015. In addition, several satellite meetings took place in Hamburg, Berlin and Stuttgart, a Sino-German workshop, three data analysis tutorials as well as special symposia on industrial catalysis and XFELs were held at the conference venue.

How to Apply for and Secure EU Funding for Collaborative IBD Research Projects

PubMed Central

Satsangi, Jack; Kitten, Olivier; Chavez, Marcela; Kalla, Rahul; Prel, Nadege; Meuwis, Marie-Alice; Scott, Stephanie; Bonetti, Illaria; Ventham, Nicholas T.

2016-01-01

The European Union offers opportunities for high-level of funding of collaborative European research. Calls are regularly published: after the end of the FP7 funding programme the new round of Horizon 2020 calls started in 2015. Several topics are relevant to inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) challenges, including chronic disease management, biomarker discovery and new treatments developments. The aim of this Viewpoint article is to describe the new Horizon 2020 instrument and the project submission procedures, and to highlight these through the description of tips and tricks, taking advantage of four examples of successful projects in the field of IBD: the SADEL, IBD-BIOM, IBD Character and BIOCYCLE projects. PMID:26744440

Methodologies for Active Aging in the Manufacturing Sector

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fornasiero, Rosanna; Berdicchia, Domenica; Zambelli, Mario; Masino, Giovanni

The research project named “Flexibly Beyond” studied and experimented innovative models for the enhancement of the role of senior workers and prolongation of their working life. The research was based on the application of innovative methods and tools to the ageing society and in particular to the European manufacturing companies represented in the project by apparel and footwear sectors. The project was funded under the Innovative Measures of the art.6 of the European Social Fund (VS/2006/0353) and coordinated by Politecnico Calzaturiero. The real strength of the project was the large network including all the actors of the value chain which allows transferring the theoretical findings to practical level in SMEs manufacturing context.

Sustainability and integration of radioecology-position paper.

PubMed

Muikku, M; Beresford, N A; Garnier-Laplace, J; Real, A; Sirkka, L; Thorne, M; Vandenhove, H; Willrodt, C

2018-03-01

This position paper gives an overview of how the COMET project (COordination and iMplementation of a pan-European instrumenT for radioecology, a combined Collaborative Project and Coordination and Support Action under the EC/Euratom 7th Framework Programme) contributed to the integration and sustainability of radioecology in Europe via its support to and interaction with the European Radioecology ALLIANCE. COMET built upon the foundations laid by the FP7 project STAR (Strategic Network for Integrating Radioecology) Network of Excellence in radioecology. In close association with the ALLIANCE, and based on the Strategic Research Agenda (SRA), COMET developed innovative mechanisms for joint programming and implementation of radioecological research. To facilitate and foster future integration under a common federating structure, research activities developed within COMET were targeted at radioecological research needs identified in the SRA. Furthermore, COMET maintained and developed strong mechanisms for knowledge exchange, dissemination and training to enhance and maintain European capacity, competence and skills in radioecology. In the short term the work to promote radioecology will continue under the H2020 project EJP-CONCERT (European Joint Programme for the Integration of Radiation Protection Research). The EJP-CONCERT project (2015-2020) aims to develop a sustainable structure for promoting and administering joint programming and open research calls in the field of radiation protection research for Europe. In the longer term, radioecological research will be facilitated by the ALLIANCE. External funding is, however, required in order to be able to answer emerging research needs.

GlobCorine- A Joint EEA-ESA Project for Operational Land Cover and Land Use Mapping at Pan-European Scale

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bontemps, S.; Defourny, P.; Van Bogaert, E.; Weber, J. L.; Arino, O.

2010-12-01

Regular and global land cover mapping contributes to evaluating the impact of human activities on the environment. Jointly supported by the European Space Agency and the European Environmental Agency, the GlobCorine project builds on the GlobCover findings and aims at making the full use of the MERIS time series for frequent land cover monitoring. The GlobCover automated classification approach has been tuned to the pan-European continent and adjusted towards a classification compatible with the Corine typology. The GlobCorine 2005 land cover map has been achieved, validated and made available to a broad- level stakeholder community from the ESA website. A first version of the GlobCorine 2009 map has also been produced, demonstrating the possibility for an operational production of frequent and updated global land cover maps.

EurOOHnet-the European research network for out-of-hours primary health care.

PubMed

Huibers, Linda; Philips, Hilde; Giesen, Paul; Remmen, Roy; Christensen, Morten Bondo; Bondevik, Gunnar Tschudi

2014-09-01

European countries face similar challenges in the provision of health care. Demographic factors like ageing, population growth, changing patient behaviour, and lack of work force lead to increasing demands, costs, and overcrowding of out-of-hours (OOH) care (i.e. primary care services, emergency departments (EDs), and ambulance services). These developments strain services and imply safety risks. In the last few decades, countries have been re-organizing their OOH primary health care services. AIM AND SCOPE OF THE NETWORK: We established a European research network for out-of-hours primary health care (EurOOHnet), which aims to transfer knowledge, share experiences, and conduct research. Combining research competencies and integrating results can generate a profound information flow to European researchers and decision makers in health policy, contributing towards feasible and high-quality OOH care. It also contributes to a more comparable performance level within European regions. CONDUCTED RESEARCH PROJECTS: The European research network aims to conduct mutual research projects. At present, three projects have been accomplished, among others concerning the diagnostic scope in OOH primary care services and guideline adherence for diagnosis and treatment of cystitis in OOH primary care. Future areas of research will be organizational models for OOH care; appropriate use of the OOH services; quality of telephone triage; quality of medical care; patient safety issues; use of auxiliary personnel; collaboration with EDs and ambulance care; and the role of GPs in OOH care.

The European community and its standardization efforts in medical informatics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mattheus, Rudy A.

1992-07-01

A summary of the CEN TC 251/4 ''Medical Imaging and Multi-Media'' activities will be given. CEN is the European standardization institute, TC 251 deals with medical informatics. Standardization is a condition for the wide scale use of health care and medical informatics and for the creation of a common market. In the last two years, three important categories-- namely, the Commission of the European Communities with their programs and the mandates, the medical informaticians through their European professional federation, and the national normalization institutes through the European committee--have shown to be aware of this problem and have taken actions. As a result, a number of AIM (Advanced Informatics in Medicine), CEC sponsored projects, the CEC mandates to CEN and EWOS, the EFMI working group on standardization, the technical committee of CEN, and the working groups and project teams of CEN and EWOS are working on the subject. On overview of the CEN TC 251/4 ''Medical Imaging and Multi-Media'' activities will be given, including their relation to other work.

Cloudnet Project

DOE Data Explorer

Hogan, Robin

2008-01-15

Cloudnet is a research project supported by the European Commission. This project aims to use data obtained quasi-continuously for the development and implementation of cloud remote sensing synergy algorithms. The use of active instruments (lidar and radar) results in detailed vertical profiles of important cloud parameters which cannot be derived from current satellite sensing techniques. A network of three already existing cloud remote sensing stations (CRS-stations) will be operated for a two year period, activities will be co-ordinated, data formats harmonised and analysis of the data performed to evaluate the representation of clouds in four major european weather forecast models.

Through Kazan ASPERA to Modern Projects

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gusev, Alexander; Kitiashvili, Irina; Petrova, Natasha

Now the European Union form the Sixth Framework Programme. One of its the objects of the EU Programme is opening national researches and training programmes. The Russian PhD students and young astronomers have business and financial difficulties in access to modern databases and astronomical projects and so they has not been included in European overview of priorities. Modern requirements to the organization of observant projects on powerful telescopes assumes painstaking scientific computer preparation of the application. A rigid competition for observation time assume preliminary computer modeling of target object for success of the application. Kazan AstroGeoPhysics Partnership

The Luneburg Sustainable University Project in International Comparison: An Assessment against North American Peers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Beringer, Almut

2007-01-01

Purpose: To assess the Luneburg Sustainable University Project (the Project) in a non-European international context; to relate the project scholarly approach to selected scholarly and practice-oriented North American sustainability in higher education (SHE) methods; to analyze project innovations against North American initiatives.…

Extremely Large Telescope Project Selected in ESFRI Roadmap

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

2006-10-01

In its first Roadmap, the European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures (ESFRI) choose the European Extremely Large Telescope (ELT), for which ESO is presently developing a Reference Design, as one of the large scale projects to be conducted in astronomy, and the only one in optical astronomy. The aim of the ELT project is to build before the end of the next decade an optical/near-infrared telescope with a diameter in the 30-60m range. ESO PR Photo 40/06 The ESFRI Roadmap states: "Extremely Large Telescopes are seen world-wide as one of the highest priorities in ground-based astronomy. They will vastly advance astrophysical knowledge allowing detailed studies of inter alia planets around other stars, the first objects in the Universe, super-massive Black Holes, and the nature and distribution of the Dark Matter and Dark Energy which dominate the Universe. The European Extremely Large Telescope project will maintain and reinforce Europe's position at the forefront of astrophysical research." Said Catherine Cesarsky, Director General of ESO: "In 2004, the ESO Council mandated ESO to play a leading role in the development of an ELT for Europe's astronomers. To that end, ESO has undertaken conceptual studies for ELTs and is currently also leading a consortium of European institutes engaged in studying enabling technologies for such a telescope. The inclusion of the ELT in the ESFRI roadmap, together with the comprehensive preparatory work already done, paves the way for the next phase of this exciting project, the design phase." ESO is currently working, in close collaboration with the European astronomical community and the industry, on a baseline design for an Extremely Large Telescope. The plan is a telescope with a primary mirror between 30 and 60 metres in diameter and a financial envelope of about 750 m Euros. It aims at more than a factor ten improvement in overall performance compared to the current leader in ground based astronomy: the ESO Very Large Telescope at the Paranal Observatory. The draft Baseline Reference Design will be presented to the wider scientific community on 29 - 30 November 2006 at a dedicated ELT Workshop Meeting in Marseille (France) and will be further reiterated. The design is then to be presented to the ESO Council at the end of 2006. The goal is to start the detailed E-ELT design work by the first half of 2007. Launched in April 2002, the European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures was set-up following a recommendation of the European Union Council, with the role to support a coherent approach to policy-making on research infrastructures in Europe, and to act as an incubator for international negotiations about concrete initiatives. In particular, ESFRI has prepared a European Roadmap identifying new Research Infrastructure of pan-European interest corresponding to the long term needs of the European research communities, covering all scientific areas, regardless of possible location and likely to be realised in the next 10 to 20 years. The Roadmap was presented on 19 October. It is the result of an intensive two-year consultation and peer review process involving over 1000 high level European and international experts. The Roadmap identifies 35 large scale infrastructure projects, at various stages of development, in seven key research areas including Environmental Sciences; Energy; Materials Sciences; Astrophysics, Astronomy, Particle and Nuclear Physics; Biomedical and Life Sciences; Social Sciences and the Humanities; Computation and data Treatment.

AGORA--IV. The Low-Skilled on the European Labour Market: Prospects and Policy Options. Towards a Minimum Learning Platform (Thessaloniki, Greece, October 29-30, 1998). CEDEFOP Panorama.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

European Centre for the Development of Vocational Training, Thessaloniki (Greece).

This booklet describes the proceedings of the fourth AGORA conference in Greece conducted by a European team of the Newskills project. (The Newskills project examines the employment prospects of those with a low level of formal education in Europe, and aims to raise awareness of the importance of a minimum learning platform after consultation with…

Uncertainty in benefit cost analysis of smart grid demonstration-projects in the U.S., China, and Italy

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Karali, Nihan; Flego, Gianluca; Yu, Jiancheng

Given the substantial investments required, there has been keen interest in conducting benefits analysis, i.e., quantifying, and often monetizing, the performance of smart grid technologies. In this study, we compare two different approaches; (1) Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI)’s benefits analysis method and its adaptation to the European contexts by the European Commission, Joint Research Centre (JRC), and (2) the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) and fuzzy logic decision making method. These are applied to three case demonstration projects executed in three different countries; the U.S., China, and Italy, considering uncertainty in each case. This work is conducted under the U.S.more » (United States)-China Climate Change Working Group, smart grid, with an additional major contribution by the European Commission. The following is a brief description of the three demonstration projects.« less

MetroBeta: Beta Spectrometry with Metallic Magnetic Calorimeters in the Framework of the European Program of Ionizing Radiation Metrology

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Loidl, M.; Beyer, J.; Bockhorn, L.; Enss, C.; Györi, D.; Kempf, S.; Kossert, K.; Mariam, R.; Nähle, O.; Paulsen, M.; Rodrigues, M.; Schmidt, M.

2018-05-01

MetroBeta is a European project aiming at the improvement of the knowledge of the shapes of beta spectra, both in terms of theoretical calculations and measurements. It is part of a common European program of ionizing radiation metrology. Metallic magnetic calorimeters (MMCs) with the beta emitter embedded in the absorber have in the past proven to be among the best beta spectrometers, in particular for low-energy beta transitions. Within this project, new designs of MMCs optimized for five different beta energy ranges were developed. A new detector module with thermal decoupling of MMC and SQUID chips was designed. An important aspect of the research and development concerns the source/absorber preparation techniques. Four beta spectra with maximum energies ranging from 76 to 709 keV will be measured. Improved theoretical calculation methods and complementary measurement techniques complete the project.

The European computer model for optronic system performance prediction (ECOMOS)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Repasi, Endre; Bijl, Piet; Labarre, Luc; Wittenstein, Wolfgang; Bürsing, Helge

2017-05-01

ECOMOS is a multinational effort within the framework of an EDA Project Arrangement. Its aim is to provide a generally accepted and harmonized European computer model for computing nominal Target Acquisition (TA) ranges of optronic imagers operating in the Visible or thermal Infrared (IR). The project involves close co-operation of defence and security industry and public research institutes from France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands and Sweden. ECOMOS uses and combines well-accepted existing European tools to build up a strong competitive position. This includes two TA models: the analytical TRM4 model and the image-based TOD model. In addition, it uses the atmosphere model MATISSE. In this paper, the central idea of ECOMOS is exposed. The overall software structure and the underlying models are shown and elucidated. The status of the project development is given as well as a short outlook on validation tests and the future potential of simulation for sensor assessment.

The projection of a test genome onto a reference population and applications to humans and archaic hominins.

PubMed

Yang, Melinda A; Harris, Kelley; Slatkin, Montgomery

2014-12-01

We introduce a method for comparing a test genome with numerous genomes from a reference population. Sites in the test genome are given a weight, w, that depends on the allele frequency, x, in the reference population. The projection of the test genome onto the reference population is the average weight for each x, [Formula: see text]. The weight is assigned in such a way that, if the test genome is a random sample from the reference population, then [Formula: see text]. Using analytic theory, numerical analysis, and simulations, we show how the projection depends on the time of population splitting, the history of admixture, and changes in past population size. The projection is sensitive to small amounts of past admixture, the direction of admixture, and admixture from a population not sampled (a ghost population). We compute the projections of several human and two archaic genomes onto three reference populations from the 1000 Genomes project-Europeans, Han Chinese, and Yoruba-and discuss the consistency of our analysis with previously published results for European and Yoruba demographic history. Including higher amounts of admixture between Europeans and Yoruba soon after their separation and low amounts of admixture more recently can resolve discrepancies between the projections and demographic inferences from some previous studies. Copyright © 2014 by the Genetics Society of America.

Clustering Analysis of Common Tasks Undertaken by Engineering Technicians in Informatics and Manufacturing in Seven European Countries

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Papadourakis, George M.; Natsika, Christina; Magnan, Myrna; Barsics, Joseph

2008-01-01

VALEURTECH is a pilot project under the European Commission's Leonardo II programme. It includes 35 partners from higher education institutions and professional organizations in eight European countries and has the major objectives: of (a) setting up a homogeneous "labelling" process, such as a diploma supplement, based on a common…

Facing Up to the Learning Organisation Challenge: Key Issues from a European Perspective. Volume I. CEDEFOP Reference Series.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Nyhan, Barry; Cressey, Peter; Tomassini, Massimo; Kelleher, Michael; Poell, Rob

This first volume of a two-volume publication provides an analytical overview of main questions emerging from recent European research and development projects related to the learning organization. Chapter 1 provides context for the European learning organization challenge and presents four main messages arising from the learning organization…

Developing the European Center of Competence on VVER-Type Nuclear Power Reactors

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Geraskin, Nikolay; Pironkov, Lyubomir; Kulikov, Evgeny; Glebov, Vasily

2017-01-01

This paper presents the results of the European educational projects CORONA and CORONA-II which are dedicated to preserving and further developing nuclear knowledge and competencies in the area of VVER-type nuclear power reactors technologies (Water-Water Energetic Reactor, WWER or VVER). The development of the European Center of Competence for…

The Role of Original Version Cinema into the European Digital Space

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Ledo-Andión, Margarita; López-Gómez, Antía; Castelló-Mayo, Enrique

2017-01-01

This paper reports the results derived from the research project, entitled "eDCINEMA: Towards the European Digital Space. The role of small cinemas in original version" (CSO2012-35784), which focused on the analysis of the role of movies in OV/OVS in achieving diversity of languages and cultures (as viewed from the European Digital…

FRG weighs ESA participation, budget issues

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

1984-11-01

Policies and expenditures for European space operations for many years to come are outlined. The Europeans must decide in the very near future whether they want to participate in the construction of the large American space station. The decision has to be a session of the ministerial council of the European Space Agency (ESA). The construction of the large rocket suited for manned space travel, the Ariane-5, has to be decided on. European finances are examined and European space expenditures are compared to the feasibility of the projects is analyzed.

European Neutrons form Parasitic Research to Global Strategy: Realizing Plans for a Transnational European Spallation Source in the Wake of the Cold War

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kaiserfeld, Thomas

2016-03-01

Studies of Big Science have early on focused on instrumentation and scientific co-operation in large organizations, later on to take into account symbolic values and specific research styles while more recently also involving the relevance of commercial interests and economic development as well as the assimilation of research traditions. In accordance with these transformed practices, this presentation will analyze how an organization with the purpose of realizing a Big-Science facility, The European Spallation Source, has successfully managed to present the project as relevant to different national and international policy-makers, to the community of European neutron researchers as well as to different industrial interests. All this has been achieved in a research-policy environment, which has been the subject to drastic transformations, from calls to engage researchers from the former eastern bloc in the early 1990s via competition with American and Asian researchers at the turn of the century 2000 to intensified demands on business applications. During this process, there has also been fierce competition between different potential sites in the U.K., Germany, Spain, Hungary and Sweden, not once, but twice. The project has in addition been plagued by withdrawals of key actors as well as challenging problems in the field of spallation-source construction. Nevertheless, the European Spallation Source has survived from the early 1990s until today, now initiating the construction process at Lund in southern Sweden. In this presentation, the different measures taken and arguments raised by the European Spallation Source project in order to realize the facility will be analysed. Especially the different designs of the European Spallation Source will be analysed as responses to external demands and threats.

European network for Health Technology Assessment Joint Action (EUnetHTA JA): a process evaluation performed by questionnaires and documentary analysis.

PubMed

Woodford Guegan, Eleanor; Cook, Andrew

2014-06-01

The European network for Health Technology Assessment Joint Action (EUnetHTA JA) project's overarching objective was to 'establish an effective and sustainable HTA [Health technology assessment] collaboration in Europe that brings added value at the regional, national and European level'. Specific objectives were to develop a strategy and business model for sustainable European collaboration on HTA, develop HTA tools and methods and promote good practice in HTA methods and processes. We describe activities performed on behalf of the National Institute for Health Research HTA programme; evaluating the project processes and developing a data set for a registry of planned clinical studies of relevance to public funders. Annual self-completion online questionnaires were sent to project participants and external stakeholders to identify their views about the project processes. Documentary review was undertaken at the project end on the final technical reports from the work packages to examine whether or not their deliverables had been achieved. The project's impact was assessed by whether or not the deliverables were produced, the objectives met and additional 'added value' generated. The project's effectiveness was evaluated by its processes, communication, administration, workings of individual work packages and involvement of external stakeholders. A two-stage Delphi exercise was undertaken to identify the data elements that should be included in a registry of planned clinical studies of relevance to public funders. The data set was validated by an efficacy testing exercise. High response rates were achieved for the questionnaires sent to project participants and this was attributed to the evidence-based strategy implemented. Response rates to questionnaires sent to external stakeholders were disappointingly lower. Most of the high-level objectives were achieved, although applying the developed tools in practice will be implemented in the European network for Health Technology Assessment Joint Action 2 (EUnetHTA JA2). Most work packages produced their planned deliverables. Networking emerged as one of the main benefits of the project and face-to-face meetings were important. However, the overarching objective did not appear to have been met because there will be a follow-up EUnetHTA JA2 project (reliant on project funding) before the establishment of any permanent network. Twelve organisations from three continents participated in the Delphi exercise to develop the data set. It was demonstrated that a registry for matching pragmatic clinical studies under consideration by funders could be built on a very small data set. This would include 10 unique items, of which five are required to describe a study and the rest are metadata. In the test sample the data set with an appropriate matching rule was able to deliver a sensitivity of between 50% and 100% and a specificity of between 43% and 86% for matching different elements. A number of recommendations have been made for the next EUnetHTA JA2 project and its evaluation. This included that the evaluation of the EUnetHTA JA2 project should extend beyond the end of the project to allow assessment of its impact; that the quality, usability and cost-effectiveness of tools in 'real-world HTA practice' should be assessed and tangible benefits of international networking should be evaluated. It is worth proceeding to develop a database registry aimed at identifying trials in development based on the data set developed. The study was funded by the National Institute for Health Research Health Technology Assessment programme (50%) and the European Union Commission (50%).

European network for Health Technology Assessment Joint Action (EUnetHTA JA): a process evaluation performed by questionnaires and documentary analysis.

PubMed Central

Woodford Guegan, Eleanor; Cook, Andrew

2014-01-01

BACKGROUND The European network for Health Technology Assessment Joint Action (EUnetHTA JA) project's overarching objective was to 'establish an effective and sustainable HTA [Health technology assessment] collaboration in Europe that brings added value at the regional, national and European level'. Specific objectives were to develop a strategy and business model for sustainable European collaboration on HTA, develop HTA tools and methods and promote good practice in HTA methods and processes. We describe activities performed on behalf of the National Institute for Health Research HTA programme; evaluating the project processes and developing a data set for a registry of planned clinical studies of relevance to public funders. METHODS Annual self-completion online questionnaires were sent to project participants and external stakeholders to identify their views about the project processes. Documentary review was undertaken at the project end on the final technical reports from the work packages to examine whether or not their deliverables had been achieved. The project's impact was assessed by whether or not the deliverables were produced, the objectives met and additional 'added value' generated. The project's effectiveness was evaluated by its processes, communication, administration, workings of individual work packages and involvement of external stakeholders. A two-stage Delphi exercise was undertaken to identify the data elements that should be included in a registry of planned clinical studies of relevance to public funders. The data set was validated by an efficacy testing exercise. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION High response rates were achieved for the questionnaires sent to project participants and this was attributed to the evidence-based strategy implemented. Response rates to questionnaires sent to external stakeholders were disappointingly lower. Most of the high-level objectives were achieved, although applying the developed tools in practice will be implemented in the European network for Health Technology Assessment Joint Action 2 (EUnetHTA JA2). Most work packages produced their planned deliverables. Networking emerged as one of the main benefits of the project and face-to-face meetings were important. However, the overarching objective did not appear to have been met because there will be a follow-up EUnetHTA JA2 project (reliant on project funding) before the establishment of any permanent network. Twelve organisations from three continents participated in the Delphi exercise to develop the data set. It was demonstrated that a registry for matching pragmatic clinical studies under consideration by funders could be built on a very small data set. This would include 10 unique items, of which five are required to describe a study and the rest are metadata. In the test sample the data set with an appropriate matching rule was able to deliver a sensitivity of between 50% and 100% and a specificity of between 43% and 86% for matching different elements. CONCLUSIONS A number of recommendations have been made for the next EUnetHTA JA2 project and its evaluation. This included that the evaluation of the EUnetHTA JA2 project should extend beyond the end of the project to allow assessment of its impact; that the quality, usability and cost-effectiveness of tools in 'real-world HTA practice' should be assessed and tangible benefits of international networking should be evaluated. It is worth proceeding to develop a database registry aimed at identifying trials in development based on the data set developed. FUNDING The study was funded by the National Institute for Health Research Health Technology Assessment programme (50%) and the European Union Commission (50%). PMID:24913263

GLANCE - calculatinG heaLth impActs of atmospheric pollutioN in a Changing climatE

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Vogel, Leif; Faria, Sérgio; Markandya, Anil

2016-04-01

Current annual global estimates of premature deaths from poor air quality are estimated in the range of 2.6-4.4 million, and 2050 projections are expected to double against 2010 levels. In Europe, annual economic burdens are estimated at around 750 bn €. Climate change will further exacerbate air pollution burdens; therefore, a better understanding of the economic impacts on human societies has become an area of intense investigation. European research efforts are being carried out within the MACC project series, which started in 2005. The outcome of this work has been integrated into a European capacity for Earth Observation, the Copernicus Atmospheric Monitoring Service (CAMS). In MACC/CAMS, key pollutant concentrations are computed at the European scale and globally by employing chemically-driven advanced transport models. The project GLANCE (calculatinG heaLth impActs of atmospheric pollutioN in a Changing climatE) aims at developing an integrated assessment model for calculating the health impacts and damage costs of air pollution at different physical scales. It combines MACC/CAMS (assimilated Earth Observations, an ensemble of chemical transport models and state of the art ECWMF weather forecasting) with downscaling based on in-situ network measurements. The strengthening of modelled projections through integration with empirical evidence reduces errors and uncertainties in the health impact projections and subsequent economic cost assessment. In addition, GLANCE will yield improved data accuracy at different time resolutions. This project is a multidisciplinary approach which brings together expertise from natural sciences and socio economic fields. Here, its general approach will be presented together with first results for the years 2007 - 2012 on the European scale. The results on health impacts and economic burdens are compared to existing assessments.

How climate, migration ability and habitat fragmentation affect the projected future distribution of European beech.

PubMed

Saltré, Frédérik; Duputié, Anne; Gaucherel, Cédric; Chuine, Isabelle

2015-02-01

Recent efforts to incorporate migration processes into species distribution models (SDMs) are allowing assessments of whether species are likely to be able to track their future climate optimum and the possible causes of failing to do so. Here, we projected the range shift of European beech over the 21st century using a process-based SDM coupled to a phenomenological migration model accounting for population dynamics, according to two climate change scenarios and one land use change scenario. Our model predicts that the climatically suitable habitat for European beech will shift north-eastward and upward mainly because (i) higher temperature and precipitation, at the northern range margins, will increase survival and fruit maturation success, while (ii) lower precipitations and higher winter temperature, at the southern range margins, will increase drought mortality and prevent bud dormancy breaking. Beech colonization rate of newly climatically suitable habitats in 2100 is projected to be very low (1-2% of the newly suitable habitats colonised). Unexpectedly, the projected realized contraction rate was higher than the projected potential contraction rate. As a result, the realized distribution of beech is projected to strongly contract by 2100 (by 36-61%) mainly due to a substantial increase in climate variability after 2050, which generates local extinctions, even at the core of the distribution, the frequency of which prevents beech recolonization during more favourable years. Although European beech will be able to persist in some parts of the trailing edge of its distribution, the combined effects of climate and land use changes, limited migration ability, and a slow life-history are likely to increase its threat status in the near future. © 2014 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Collaboration Networks in Applied Conservation Projects across Europe

PubMed Central

Manolache, Steluta; Ciocănea, Cristiana Maria; Miu, Iulia Viorica; Popescu, Viorel Dan

2016-01-01

The main funding instrument for implementing EU policies on nature conservation and supporting environmental and climate action is the LIFE Nature programme, established by the European Commission in 1992. LIFE Nature projects (>1400 awarded) are applied conservation projects in which partnerships between institutions are critical for successful conservation outcomes, yet little is known about the structure of collaborative networks within and between EU countries. The aim of our study is to understand the nature of collaboration in LIFE Nature projects using a novel application of social network theory at two levels: (1) collaboration between countries, and (2) collaboration within countries using six case studies: Western Europe (United Kingdom and Netherlands), Eastern Europe (Romania and Latvia) and Southern Europe (Greece and Portugal). Using data on 1261 projects financed between 1996 and 2013, we found that Italy was the most successful country not only in terms of awarded number of projects, but also in terms of overall influence being by far the most influent country in the European LIFE Nature network, having the highest eigenvector (0.989) and degree centrality (0.177). Another key player in the network is Netherlands, which ensures a fast communication flow with other network members (closeness—0.318) by staying connected with the most active countries. Although Western European countries have higher centrality scores than most of the Eastern European countries, our results showed that overall there is a lower tendency to create partnerships between different organization categories. Also, the comparisons of the six case studies indicates significant differences in regards to the pattern of creating partnerships, providing valuable information on collaboration on EU nature conservation. This study represents a starting point in predicting the formation of future partnerships within LIFE Nature programme, suggesting ways to improve transnational cooperation and communication. PMID:27723834

Collaboration Networks in Applied Conservation Projects across Europe.

PubMed

Nita, Andreea; Rozylowicz, Laurentiu; Manolache, Steluta; Ciocănea, Cristiana Maria; Miu, Iulia Viorica; Popescu, Viorel Dan

2016-01-01

The main funding instrument for implementing EU policies on nature conservation and supporting environmental and climate action is the LIFE Nature programme, established by the European Commission in 1992. LIFE Nature projects (>1400 awarded) are applied conservation projects in which partnerships between institutions are critical for successful conservation outcomes, yet little is known about the structure of collaborative networks within and between EU countries. The aim of our study is to understand the nature of collaboration in LIFE Nature projects using a novel application of social network theory at two levels: (1) collaboration between countries, and (2) collaboration within countries using six case studies: Western Europe (United Kingdom and Netherlands), Eastern Europe (Romania and Latvia) and Southern Europe (Greece and Portugal). Using data on 1261 projects financed between 1996 and 2013, we found that Italy was the most successful country not only in terms of awarded number of projects, but also in terms of overall influence being by far the most influent country in the European LIFE Nature network, having the highest eigenvector (0.989) and degree centrality (0.177). Another key player in the network is Netherlands, which ensures a fast communication flow with other network members (closeness-0.318) by staying connected with the most active countries. Although Western European countries have higher centrality scores than most of the Eastern European countries, our results showed that overall there is a lower tendency to create partnerships between different organization categories. Also, the comparisons of the six case studies indicates significant differences in regards to the pattern of creating partnerships, providing valuable information on collaboration on EU nature conservation. This study represents a starting point in predicting the formation of future partnerships within LIFE Nature programme, suggesting ways to improve transnational cooperation and communication.

Zipf's Law Application To Oil Spill Detection In The Ocean

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Platonov, A.; Redondo, J. M.

One of the results of the CLEAN SEAS European Union project using SAR imaging of European Coastal Waters was the statistical analysis and detection of thousands of oil spills and slicks in the three compared sections, Baltic Sea, North Sea and N.W. Mediterranean. The results of another European Project, OIL WATCH together with the past 30 years of recorded mayor tanker accidental oil spills have been used in a predictive scheme that subject to spatial and temporal normalization of these two different scale processes clearly shows that the annual probability of the occurence of an oil spill follows Zipf's law. Local deviations from the law may be also explained in terms of multifractal analysis.

What strategy should France implement for H2020?

PubMed

Dhainaut, Jean-François; Diebolt, Vincent; Pouletty-Lefèbvre, Brigitte; Baker, Angela; Bassompierre, François; Borel, Thomas; Braunstein, David; Demotes, Jacques; François, Bruno; Huet, Stéphane; Micallef, Joëlle; Misse, Christophe; Molon, Annamaria; Rascol, Olivier; Ravoire, Sophie; Schwartz, Bertrand; Donne, Nathalie; Donne, Nathalie; Fusaï, Guillaume; Pouletty, Philippe; Vicaut, Eric

2015-01-01

The initiation of Horizon 2020--the European Union's 8th Framework Programme for Research and Innovation, allotted a budget of 79 billion euros--provides an opportunity to review France's participation in previous Framework Programmes. Indeed, French participation does not match either its scientific importance or its financial investment. While France contributed 16.5 to 17% of the EU's 7th Framework Programme research budget, its return through the funding of coordinated projects in which French teams are participating stands at around 12.5 to 13%, a shortfall of 600 million euros. Although the situation depends on the type of activity, French participation in clinical research appears to be smaller than that of its neighbours, with fewer responses to European calls for proposals. While France has many assets, which include the assured funding of clinical research, structured thematic networks and the initiation of major national programmes, it suffers from the dilution of resources due to France's regional development policy, the lack of multidisciplinarity and the ignorance of both the medical and scientific community and the institutions to which they belong as to how Horizon 2020 actually works. We propose three types of strategy to encourage proposals for coordinated clinical research projects or projects involving French teams, and to help in the drawing up of applications: Broaden the vision of our children, students and colleagues, helping them to adapt to the globalisation of knowledge throughout their educational and professional lives. Recognise the value of European actions to influence the European landscape and change mentalities. Help and support project initiators by pooling skills within a limited number of expert centres designed to assist them in their funding application. • Broaden the vision of our children, students and colleagues, helping them to adapt to the globalisation of knowledge throughout their educational and professional lives. • Recognise the value of European actions to influence the European landscape and change mentalities. • Help and support project initiators by pooling skills within a limited number of expert centres designed to assist them in their funding application. © 2015 Société Française de Pharmacologie et de Thérapeutique.

EMODnet High Resolution Seabed Mapping - further developing a high resolution digital bathymetry for European seas

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Schaap, Dick M. A.; Schmitt, Thierry

2017-04-01

Access to marine data is a key issue for the EU Marine Strategy Framework Directive and the EU Marine Knowledge 2020 agenda and includes the European Marine Observation and Data Network (EMODnet) initiative. EMODnet aims at assembling European marine data, data products and metadata from diverse sources in a uniform way. The EMODnet data infrastructure is developed through a stepwise approach in three major phases. Currently EMODnet is entering its 3rd phase with operational portals providing access to marine data for bathymetry, geology, physics, chemistry, biology, seabed habitats and human activities, complemented by checkpoint projects, analysing the fitness for purpose of data provision. The EMODnet Bathymetry project has developed Digital Terrain Models (DTM) for the European seas. These have been produced from survey and aggregated data sets that are indexed with metadata by adopting the SeaDataNet Catalogue services. SeaDataNet is a network of major oceanographic data centres around the European seas that manage, operate and further develop a pan-European infrastructure for marine and ocean data management. The latest EMODnet Bathymetry DTM release has a resolution of 1/8 arcminute * 1/8 arcminute and covers all European sea regions. Use has been made of circa 7800 gathered survey datasets and composite DTMs from 27 European data providers from 15 countries. For areas without coverage use has been made of the latest GEBCO DTM. The catalogue services and the generated EMODnet DTM have been published at the dedicated EMODnet Bathymetry portal which includes a versatile DTM viewing service that also supports downloading in various formats. End December 2016 the Bathymetry project has been succeeded by EMODnet High Resolution Seabed Mapping (HRSM) as part of the third phase of EMODnet. This new project will continue gathering of bathymetric in-situ data sets with extra efforts for near coastal waters and coastal zones. In addition Satellite Derived Bathymetry data will be included and in particular to fill gaps in coverage of the coastal zones. The data and composite DTMs will increase the coverage of the European seas and its coastlines, and provide input for producing an EMODnet DTM with a common resolution of 3 arc seconds versus 1/8 arc minutes at present. Moreover local DTMs with even higher resolutions will be produced, where data and data providers permit. The Bathymetry Viewing and Download service will be upgraded to provide a multi-resolution map and including 3D viewing. The higher resolution DTMs will also be used to determine best-estimates of the European coastline for a range of tidal levels (HAT, MHW, MSL, Chart Datum, LAT), thereby making use of a tidal model for Europe. Extra challenges will be 'moving to the cloud' and setting up an EMODnet Collaborative Virtual Environment (CVE) for producing the EMODnet DTMs. The presentation will highlight key details of EMODnet Bathymetry results and the way how challenges of the new HRSM project are approached.

Outrunning damage: Electrons vs X-rays-timescales and mechanisms.

PubMed

Spence, John C H

2017-07-01

Toward the end of his career, Zewail developed strong interest in fast electron spectroscopy and imaging, a field to which he made important contributions toward his aim of making molecular movies free of radiation damage. We therefore compare here the atomistic mechanisms leading to destruction of protein samples in diffract-and-destroy experiments for the cases of high-energy electron beam irradiation and X-ray laser pulses. The damage processes and their time-scales are compared and relevant elastic, inelastic, and photoelectron cross sections are given. Inelastic mean-free paths for ejected electrons at very low energies in insulators are compared with the bioparticle size. The dose rate and structural damage rate for electrons are found to be much lower, allowing longer pulses, reduced beam current, and Coulomb interactions for the formation of smaller probes. High-angle electron scattering from the nucleus, which has no parallel in the X-ray case, tracks the slowly moving nuclei during the explosion, just as the gain of the XFEL (X-ray free-electron laser) has no parallel in the electron case. Despite reduced damage and much larger elastic scattering cross sections in the electron case, leading to not dissimilar elastic scattering rates (when account is taken of the greatly increased incident XFEL fluence), progress for single-particle electron diffraction is seen to depend on the effort to reduce emittance growth due to Coulomb interactions, and so allow formation of intense sub-micron beams no larger than a virus.

X-ray lasers for structural and dynamic biology

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Spence, J. C. H.; Weierstall, U.; Chapman, H. N.

2012-10-01

Research opportunities and techniques are reviewed for the application of hard x-ray pulsed free-electron lasers (XFEL) to structural biology. These include the imaging of protein nanocrystals, single particles such as viruses, pump-probe experiments for time-resolved nanocrystallography, and snapshot wide-angle x-ray scattering (WAXS) from molecules in solution. The use of femtosecond exposure times, rather than freezing of samples, as a means of minimizing radiation damage is shown to open up new opportunities for the molecular imaging of biochemical reactions at room temperature in solution. This is possible using a ‘diffract-and-destroy’ mode in which the incident pulse terminates before radiation damage begins. Methods for delivering hundreds of hydrated bioparticles per second (in random orientations) to a pulsed x-ray beam are described. New data analysis approaches are outlined for the correlated fluctuations in fast WAXS, for protein nanocrystals just a few molecules on a side, and for the continuous x-ray scattering from a single virus. Methods for determining the orientation of a molecule from its diffraction pattern are reviewed. Methods for the preparation of protein nanocrystals are also reviewed. New opportunities for solving the phase problem for XFEL data are outlined. A summary of the latest results is given, which now extend to atomic resolution for nanocrystals. Possibilities for time-resolved chemistry using fast WAXS (solution scattering) from mixtures is reviewed, toward the general goal of making molecular movies of biochemical processes.

Solid - solid and solid - liquid phase transitions of iron and iron alloys under laser shock compression

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Harmand, M.; Krygier, A.; Appel, K.; Galtier, E.; Hartley, N.; Konopkova, Z.; Lee, H. J.; McBride, E. E.; Miyanishi, K.; Nagler, B.; Nemausat, R.; Vinci, T.; Zhu, D.; Ozaki, N.; Fiquet, G.

2017-12-01

An accurate knowledge of the properties of iron and iron alloys at high pressures and temperatures is crucial for understanding and modelling planetary interiors. While Earth-size and Super-Earth Exoplanets are being discovered in increasingly large numbers, access to detailed information on liquid properties, melting curves and even solid phases of iron and iron at the pressures and temperatures of their interiors is still strongly limited. In this context, XFEL sources coupled with high-energy lasers afford unique opportunities to measure microscopic structural properties at far extreme conditions. Also the achievable time resolution allows the shock history and phase transition mechanisms to be followed during laser compression, improving our understanding of the high pressure and high strain experiments. Here we present recent studies devoted to investigate the solid-solid and solid-liquid transition in laser-shocked iron and iron alloys (Fe-Si, Fe-C and Fe-O alloys) using X-ray diffraction and X-ray diffuse scattering. Experiment were performed at the MEC end-station of the LCLS facility at SLAC (USA). Detection of the diffuse scattering allowed the identification of the first liquid peak position along the Hugoniot, up to 4 Mbar. The time resolution shows ultrafast (between several tens and several hundreds of picoseconds) solid-solid and solid-liquid phase transitions. Future developments at XFEL facilities will enable detailed studies of the solid and liquid structures of iron and iron alloys as well as out-of-Hugoniot studies.

In vivo crystallography at X-ray free-electron lasers: the next generation of structural biology?

PubMed

Gallat, François-Xavier; Matsugaki, Naohiro; Coussens, Nathan P; Yagi, Koichiro J; Boudes, Marion; Higashi, Tetsuya; Tsuji, Daisuke; Tatano, Yutaka; Suzuki, Mamoru; Mizohata, Eiichi; Tono, Kensuke; Joti, Yasumasa; Kameshima, Takashi; Park, Jaehyun; Song, Changyong; Hatsui, Takaki; Yabashi, Makina; Nango, Eriko; Itoh, Kohji; Coulibaly, Fasséli; Tobe, Stephen; Ramaswamy, S; Stay, Barbara; Iwata, So; Chavas, Leonard M G

2014-07-17

The serendipitous discovery of the spontaneous growth of protein crystals inside cells has opened the field of crystallography to chemically unmodified samples directly available from their natural environment. On the one hand, through in vivo crystallography, protocols for protein crystal preparation can be highly simplified, although the technique suffers from difficulties in sampling, particularly in the extraction of the crystals from the cells partly due to their small sizes. On the other hand, the extremely intense X-ray pulses emerging from X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) sources, along with the appearance of serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) is a milestone for radiation damage-free protein structural studies but requires micrometre-size crystals. The combination of SFX with in vivo crystallography has the potential to boost the applicability of these techniques, eventually bringing the field to the point where in vitro sample manipulations will no longer be required, and direct imaging of the crystals from within the cells will be achievable. To fully appreciate the diverse aspects of sample characterization, handling and analysis, SFX experiments at the Japanese SPring-8 angstrom compact free-electron laser were scheduled on various types of in vivo grown crystals. The first experiments have demonstrated the feasibility of the approach and suggest that future in vivo crystallography applications at XFELs will be another alternative to nano-crystallography. © 2014 The Author(s) Published by the Royal Society. All rights reserved.

Current trends in protein crystallization.

PubMed

Gavira, José A

2016-07-15

Proteins belong to the most complex colloidal system in terms of their physicochemical properties, size and conformational-flexibility. This complexity contributes to their great sensitivity to any external change and dictate the uncertainty of crystallization. The need of 3D models to understand their functionality and interaction mechanisms with other neighbouring (macro)molecules has driven the tremendous effort put into the field of crystallography that has also permeated other fields trying to shed some light into reluctant-to-crystallize proteins. This review is aimed at revising protein crystallization from a regular-laboratory point of view. It is also devoted to highlight the latest developments and achievements to produce, identify and deliver high-quality protein crystals for XFEL, Micro-ED or neutron diffraction. The low likelihood of protein crystallization is rationalized by considering the intrinsic polypeptide nature (folded state, surface charge, etc) followed by a description of the standard crystallization methods (batch, vapour diffusion and counter-diffusion), including high throughput advances. Other methodologies aimed at determining protein features in solution (NMR, SAS, DLS) or to gather structural information from single particles such as Cryo-EM are also discussed. Finally, current approaches showing the convergence of different structural biology techniques and the cross-methodologies adaptation to tackle the most difficult problems, are presented. Current advances in biomacromolecules crystallization, from nano crystals for XFEL and Micro-ED to large crystals for neutron diffraction, are covered with special emphasis in methodologies applicable at laboratory scale. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Outrunning damage: Electrons vs X-rays—timescales and mechanisms

PubMed Central

Spence, John C. H.

2017-01-01

Toward the end of his career, Zewail developed strong interest in fast electron spectroscopy and imaging, a field to which he made important contributions toward his aim of making molecular movies free of radiation damage. We therefore compare here the atomistic mechanisms leading to destruction of protein samples in diffract-and-destroy experiments for the cases of high-energy electron beam irradiation and X-ray laser pulses. The damage processes and their time-scales are compared and relevant elastic, inelastic, and photoelectron cross sections are given. Inelastic mean-free paths for ejected electrons at very low energies in insulators are compared with the bioparticle size. The dose rate and structural damage rate for electrons are found to be much lower, allowing longer pulses, reduced beam current, and Coulomb interactions for the formation of smaller probes. High-angle electron scattering from the nucleus, which has no parallel in the X-ray case, tracks the slowly moving nuclei during the explosion, just as the gain of the XFEL (X-ray free-electron laser) has no parallel in the electron case. Despite reduced damage and much larger elastic scattering cross sections in the electron case, leading to not dissimilar elastic scattering rates (when account is taken of the greatly increased incident XFEL fluence), progress for single-particle electron diffraction is seen to depend on the effort to reduce emittance growth due to Coulomb interactions, and so allow formation of intense sub-micron beams no larger than a virus. PMID:28653018

EDITORIAL: Metrological Aspects of Accelerator Technology and High Energy Physics Experiments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Romaniuk, Ryszard S.; Pozniak, Krzysztof T.

2007-08-01

The subject of this special feature in Measurement Science and Technology concerns measurement methods, devices and subsystems, both hardware and software aspects, applied in large experiments of high energy physics (HEP) and superconducting RF accelerator technology (SRF). These experiments concern mainly the physics of elementary particles or the building of new machines and detectors. The papers present practical examples of applied solutions in large, contemporary, international research projects such as HERA, LHC, FLASH, XFEL, ILC and others. These machines are unique in their global scale and consist of extremely dedicated apparatus. The apparatus is characterized by very large dimensions, a considerable use of resources and a high level of overall technical complexity. They possess a large number of measurement channels (ranging from thousands to over 100 million), are characterized by fast of processing of measured data and high measurement accuracies, and work in quite adverse environments. The measurement channels cooperate with a large number of different sensors of momenta, energies, trajectories of elementary particles, electron, proton and photon beam profiles, accelerating fields in resonant cavities, and many others. The provision of high quality measurement systems requires the designers to use only the most up-to-date technical solutions, measurement technologies, components and devices. Research work in these demanding fields is a natural birthplace of new measurement methods, new data processing and acquisition algorithms, complex, networked measurement system diagnostics and monitoring. These developments are taking place in both hardware and software layers. The chief intention of this special feature is that the papers represent equally some of the most current metrology research problems in HEP and SRF. The accepted papers have been divided into four topical groups: superconducting cavities (4 papers), low level RF systems (8 papers), ionizing radiation (5 papers) and HEP experiments (8 papers). The editors would like to thank cordially all the authors who accepted our invitation to present their very recent results. A number of authors of the papers in this issue are active in the 6th European Framework Research Program CARE—Coordinated Accelerators Research in Europe and ELAN—the European Linear Accelerator Network. Some authors are active in research programs of a global extent such as the LHC, ILC and GDE—the Global Design Effort for the International Linear Collider. We also would like to thank personally, as well as on behalf of all the authors, the Editorial Board of Measurement Science and Technology for accepting this very exciting field of contemporary metrology. This field seems to be really a birthplace of a host of new metrological technologies, where the driving force is the incredibly high technical requirements that must soon be fulfilled if we dream of building new accelerators for elementary particles, new biological materials and medicine alike. Special thanks are due to Professor R S Jachowicz of Warsaw University of Technology for initiating this issue and for continuous support and advice during our work.

Reflections on Post-16 Strategies in European Countries. Interim Report of the Leonardo da Vinci/Multiplier Effect Project III.3.a. Priority 2: Forging Links between Educational Establishments and Enterprises (1997-2000) ID 27009. Working Papers, No. 9.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Stenstrom, Marja-Leena, Ed.

This four-part publication contains 19 papers on educational practices and promises for post-16 education in European countries. Part I, the introduction, contains these three papers: "Sharpening Post-16 Education Strategies: Building on the Results of the Previous Projects" (Johanna Lasonen); "'Parity of Esteem' and 'Integrated…

Envri Cluster - a Community-Driven Platform of European Environmental Researcher Infrastructures for Providing Common E-Solutions for Earth Science

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Asmi, A.; Sorvari, S.; Kutsch, W. L.; Laj, P.

2017-12-01

European long-term environmental research infrastructures (often referred as ESFRI RIs) are the core facilities for providing services for scientists in their quest for understanding and predicting the complex Earth system and its functioning that requires long-term efforts to identify environmental changes (trends, thresholds and resilience, interactions and feedbacks). Many of the research infrastructures originally have been developed to respond to the needs of their specific research communities, however, it is clear that strong collaboration among research infrastructures is needed to serve the trans-boundary research requires exploring scientific questions at the intersection of different scientific fields, conducting joint research projects and developing concepts, devices, and methods that can be used to integrate knowledge. European Environmental research infrastructures have already been successfully worked together for many years and have established a cluster - ENVRI cluster - for their collaborative work. ENVRI cluster act as a collaborative platform where the RIs can jointly agree on the common solutions for their operations, draft strategies and policies and share best practices and knowledge. Supporting project for the ENVRI cluster, ENVRIplus project, brings together 21 European research infrastructures and infrastructure networks to work on joint technical solutions, data interoperability, access management, training, strategies and dissemination efforts. ENVRI cluster act as one stop shop for multidisciplinary RI users, other collaborative initiatives, projects and programmes and coordinates and implement jointly agreed RI strategies.

Towards Mars — Stratospheric Balloons as Test-Beds for Mars Exploration

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Dannenberg, K.

2018-04-01

The abstract deals with the possibilities to use stratospheric balloons for Mars science and technology needs, especially with the opportunities offered by the new European infrastructure project HEMERA, recently selected by the European Commission.

European Patient Summary Guideline: Focus on Greece.

PubMed

Berler, Alexander; Tagaris, Anastassios; Chronaki, Catherine

2016-01-01

The European Patient Summary (PS) guideline specifies a minimal dataset of essential and important information for unplanned or emergency care initially defined in the epSOS project with aim to improve patients' safety and quality of Care. The eHealth Network of European Union (EU) Member State (MS) representatives established under Article 14 of the EU directive 2011/24 on patient rights to cross-border healthcare adopted PS guideline in November 2013 and since then the guideline has been part of MS strategic eHealth implementation plans, standardization efforts, and concrete regional, national, European and international projects. This paper reviews implementation efforts for the implementation of an operational patient summary service in Greece drawing on challenges and lessons learned for sustainable standards-based large scale eHealth deployment in Europe and abroad, as well as the reuse of best practices from international standards and integration profiles.

Flood risk governance arrangements in Europe

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Matczak, P.; Lewandowski, J.; Choryński, A.; Szwed, M.; Kundzewicz, Z. W.

2015-06-01

The STAR-FLOOD (Strengthening and Redesigning European Flood Risk Practices Towards Appropriate and Resilient Flood Risk Governance Arrangements) project, funded by the European Commission, investigates strategies for dealing with flood risk in six European countries: Belgium, the UK, France, the Netherlands, Poland and Sweden and in 18 vulnerable urban regions in these countries. The project aims to describe, analyse, explain, and evaluate the main similarities and differences between the selected EU Member States in terms of development and performance of flood risk governance arrangements. It also discusses the scientific and societal importance of these similarities and differences. Attention is paid to identification and characterization of shifts in flood risk governance arrangements and in flood risk management strategies and to determination of triggering factors and restraining factors. An assessment of a change of resilience and appropriateness (legitimacy, effectiveness, efficiency) of flood risk governance arrangements in Poland is presented and comparison with other European countries is offered.

CMIP5-downscaled projections for the NW European Shelf Seas: initial results and insights into uncertainties

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tinker, Jonathan; Palmer, Matthew; Lowe, Jason; Howard, Tom

2017-04-01

The North Sea, and wider Northwest European Shelf seas (NWS) are economically, environmentally, and culturally important for a number of European countries. They are protected by European legislation, often with specific reference to the potential impacts of climate change. Coastal climate change projections are an important source of information for effective management of European Shelf Seas. For example, potential changes in the marine environment are a key component of the climate change risk assessments (CCRAs) carried out under the UK Climate Change Act We use the NEMO shelf seas model combined with CMIP5 climate model and EURO-CORDEX regional atmospheric model data to generate new simulations of the NWS. Building on previous work using a climate model perturbed physics ensemble and the POLCOMS, this new model setup is used to provide first indication of the uncertainties associated with: (i) the driving climate model; (ii) the atmospheric downscaling model (iii) the shelf seas downscaling model; (iv) the choice of climate change scenario. Our analysis considers a range of physical marine impacts and the drivers of coastal variability and change, including sea level and the propagation of open ocean signals onto the shelf. The simulations are being carried out as part of the UK Climate Projections 2018 (UKCP18) and will feed into the following UK CCRA.

Continuing Education of Civics Teachers for Teaching the European Union: Results of the Jean Monnet Project PEB

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Oberle, Monika; Forstmann, Johanna

2015-01-01

The European dimension is of salient importance for understanding and shaping politics especially, but not only, in Europe. The European Union by now has become a compulsory content of civics classes in secondary schools throughout Germany. For teachers, however, teaching this topic is connected with manifold difficulties, for example, due to the…

Quality and Quality Assurance in Vocational Education and Training in the Mediterranean Countries: Lessons from the European Approach

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Masson, Jean-Raymond; Baati, Mounir; Seyfried, Erwin

2010-01-01

This article reflects on the development of the European approach towards quality and quality assurance in vocational education and training (VET) and its relevance for VET reforms in the European Training Foundation (ETF) partner countries. The analysis is based on an ETF project conducted in 2007-2008 in the Mediterranean partner countries to…

Quality Assurance in Engineering Education on a National and European Scale

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Gola, Muzio M.

2005-01-01

Activity 2 of project E4, "Quality Assessment and Transparency for Enhanced Mobility and Trans-European Recognition", included the working group on "Quality Assurance in Engineering on a National and European Scale". Its report can be found in Part 2 of Volume D, final report of the E4 Thematic Network (Firenze University Press 2003). The Report…

Towards estimates of future rainfall erosivity in Europe based on REDES and WorldClim datasets

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Panagos, Panos; Ballabio, Cristiano; Meusburger, Katrin; Spinoni, Jonathan; Alewell, Christine; Borrelli, Pasquale

2017-05-01

The policy requests to develop trends in soil erosion changes can be responded developing modelling scenarios of the two most dynamic factors in soil erosion, i.e. rainfall erosivity and land cover change. The recently developed Rainfall Erosivity Database at European Scale (REDES) and a statistical approach used to spatially interpolate rainfall erosivity data have the potential to become useful knowledge to predict future rainfall erosivity based on climate scenarios. The use of a thorough statistical modelling approach (Gaussian Process Regression), with the selection of the most appropriate covariates (monthly precipitation, temperature datasets and bioclimatic layers), allowed to predict the rainfall erosivity based on climate change scenarios. The mean rainfall erosivity for the European Union and Switzerland is projected to be 857 MJ mm ha-1 h-1 yr-1 till 2050 showing a relative increase of 18% compared to baseline data (2010). The changes are heterogeneous in the European continent depending on the future projections of most erosive months (hot period: April-September). The output results report a pan-European projection of future rainfall erosivity taking into account the uncertainties of the climatic models.

Towards estimates of future rainfall erosivity in Europe based on REDES and WorldClim datasets.

PubMed

Panagos, Panos; Ballabio, Cristiano; Meusburger, Katrin; Spinoni, Jonathan; Alewell, Christine; Borrelli, Pasquale

2017-05-01

The policy requests to develop trends in soil erosion changes can be responded developing modelling scenarios of the two most dynamic factors in soil erosion, i.e. rainfall erosivity and land cover change. The recently developed Rainfall Erosivity Database at European Scale (REDES) and a statistical approach used to spatially interpolate rainfall erosivity data have the potential to become useful knowledge to predict future rainfall erosivity based on climate scenarios. The use of a thorough statistical modelling approach (Gaussian Process Regression), with the selection of the most appropriate covariates (monthly precipitation, temperature datasets and bioclimatic layers), allowed to predict the rainfall erosivity based on climate change scenarios. The mean rainfall erosivity for the European Union and Switzerland is projected to be 857 MJ mm ha -1  h -1  yr -1 till 2050 showing a relative increase of 18% compared to baseline data (2010). The changes are heterogeneous in the European continent depending on the future projections of most erosive months (hot period: April-September). The output results report a pan-European projection of future rainfall erosivity taking into account the uncertainties of the climatic models.

Scientix: the new internet-based community for science education in europe

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Cunha, C.; Gras-Velázquez, À.; Gerard, E.

2012-04-01

The objectives of the Lisbon declaration (2000) and the affirmation of the European Commission that there is a need to promote more widely inquiry based science education methodologies in primary and secondary schools and to support teachers' networks (2007), were the basis for launch by European Schoolnet (EUN) of Scientix, a new web-based information platform for science education in Europe. It's aim is to ensure the regular dissemination and sharing of progress, know-how, and best practices in the field of science education and providing a feedback mechanism. Scientix is a three-year project run by EUN since December 2009 on behalf of the European Commission Directorate General Research and is funded under the 7th Framework Programme. The portal (http://www.scientix.eu), available in six European languages, offers a resource repository containing hundreds of teaching materials from European projects, but also research reports and policy-making documents; a translation on demand service for the teaching materials towards any of the 23 languages of the European Union; a community including a forum and chat rooms; an online news service featuring international science education topics and a calendar of forthcoming events and training opportunities; and also a newsletter sent once a month to registered users. The Scientix main targets are teachers, providing teaching materials, scientific support and documentation that are able to give them some quality tools for the development and implementation of inquiry based science education teaching methodologies. Besides the website, several events and workshops will be organized during the three years of the project. Workshops and newsletters to inform science teachers, give them tools to use the Scientix platform in class effectively and meet other science teachers in Europe will be organized from 2010 to 2012 and will take place in several European countries. An example of this was the Scientix European Conference that took place at Brussels from 6 to 8 of May 2011, which had the participation of around 400 teachers and education staff from 37 countries.

VERAM - Vision and Roadmap for European Raw Materials

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Baumgarten, Wibke; Vashev, Boris

2017-04-01

The overall objective of VERAM project is to produce a Vision and Roadmap for European Raw Materials in 2050 based on raw materials research and innovation (R&I) coordination. Two leading European Technology Platforms (ETPs): ETP SMR (Sustainable Minerals Resources) and FTP (Forest Technology Platform) are joining forces to develop a common vison and roadmap with the support of ECTP (European Construction Technology Platform), represented by UNIVPM, SusChem (ETP for Sustainable Chemistry), represented by Cefic, EuMaT (Advanced Materials ETP), represented by VITO, ERAMIN 2, represented by Research Centre JUELICH and WoodWisdom Network Plus represented by the Agency for Renewable Resources (FNR). This partnership provides VERAM with expertise from downstream applications and additional knowledge on non-biotic and biotic raw materials. The project encourages capacity building as well as transfer of knowledge. It expects to provide an innovation reference point for the European Institute of Innovation & Technology (EIT) Raw Materials (formerly the KIC Raw MatTERS), to coordinate the network involved in the European Innovation Partnership (EIP) on Raw Materials Commitments and relevant proposals funded under Horizon 2020. It provides a platform for identifying gaps and complementarities and enables their bridging. VERAM will be able to advise the European Commission and Member States on future research needs and policies to stimulate innovation and assist in overcoming fragmentation in the implementing the EIP Raw Materials Strategic Implementation Plan. VERAM looks for mutually beneficial information exchange, encourages cross-fertilization between actions undertaken by different raw material industries, and expects to accelerate exploitation of breakthrough innovations. One of the main outcomes of the project is the presentation of a common long term 2050 Vision and Roadmap for relevant raw materials including metals, industrial minerals and aggregates and wood. The Vision and Roadmap have the objective of highlighting the path to achieving the European Commission's ambitious target of 80% reduction in CO2 emissions by 2050.

The scientific programme between ESRO and ESA: Choosing new projects (1973-1977)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Russo, Arturo

1995-02-01

The ESA History Study Reports are preliminary reports of studies carried out within the framework of an ESA (European Space Agency) contract. They will form the basis of a comprehensive study of European Space activities covering the period 1959-1987. The transformation of ESRO (European Space Research Organization) into ESA found the Organization's bodies involved in a new round of the decision-making process to select future scientific satellite projects. In this report, the three main phases of the decision-making process are discussed. The first, from June 1973 to April 1974, the European scientific community and their representatives in ESA's advisory committee structure were invited to agree on a set of space missions for which a definition study was recommended. At the end of this phase, thirteen missions were selected for such a definition study by ESRO's Scientific Program Board (SPB). The second phase covers the period from that decision up to March 1975, when a much more important decision was required, namely to select a restricted number of missions for which a feasibility study was to be performed. The aims of such feasibility studies were to establish the technical and financial feasibility of each project, to propose a well-defined project concept, to identify the research and technology effort required to support it, and to state a preliminary cost estimate to completion. The third phase covers the first two years of the new Agency's life, and concludes with the selection of the projects to be adopted in ESA's scientific program.

DG Connect Funded Projects on Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) for Old Age People: Beyond Silos, CareWell and SmartCare.

PubMed

Keijser, W; de Manuel-Keenoy, E; d'Angelantonio, M; Stafylas, P; Hobson, P; Apuzzo, G; Hurtado, M; Oates, J; Bousquet, J; Senn, A

2016-01-01

Information and communication technologies (ICT) are promising for the long-term care of older and frequently frail people. These innovations can improve health outcomes, quality of life and efficiency of care processes, while supporting independent living. However, they may be disruptive innovations. As all European member states are facing an increasing complexity of health and social care, good practices in ICT should be identified and evaluated. Three projects funded by DG CNECT are related to Active and Healthy Ageing (AHA) and frailty: (i) BeyondSilos, dealing with independent living and integrated services, (ii) CareWell, providing integrated care coordination, patient empowerment and home support and (iii) SmartCare, proposing a common set of standard functional specifications for an ICT platform enabling the delivery of integrated care to older patients. The three projects described in this paper provide a unique pan-European research field to further study implementation efforts and outcomes of new technologies. Below, based on a description of the projects, the authors display four domains that are in their views fundamental for in-depth exploration of heterogeneity in the European context: 1. Definition of easily transferable, high level pathways with solid evidence-base; 2. Change management in implementing ICT enabled integrated care; 3. Evaluation and data collection methodologies based on existing experience with MAST and MEDAL methodologies; and 4. Construction of new models for delivery of health and social care. Understanding complementarity, synergies and differences between the three unique projects can help to identify a more effective roll out of best practices within a varying European context.

Projections of European summer tourism demand at a +2 degrees warmer climate.

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Grillakis, Manolis; Koutroulis, Aristeidis; Tsanis, Ioannis; Jacob, Daniela

2015-04-01

Tourism is a billion euros industry for Europe and especially for the southern countries for which summer tourism is an important contribution to their GDP. It is highly dependent on the climate and any future changes will alter the favorability of European destinations. The impact of a potential global temperature increase of 1.5 and 2 degrees on European tourism was investigated in the frame of IMPACT2C FP7 project. Climate information from four ENSEMBLES and five Euro-CORDEX RCMs were used to estimate the Tourism Climatic Index (TCI) under the A1B, RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 scenarios. The monthly averages of the historical TCI estimates were correlated to the recorded monthly averages of overnight stays for all considered NUTS3 regions in Europe. The correlation proved to be significantly high for the majority of these regions with higher values for the European South, while the lowest correlation was attained for Sweden Denmark and Austria. The correlation estimates was then used to provide information about the change in tourism activity due to changes in the future climate favorability through the TCI. The results show that for the May to October "summer tourism" season, and under +1.5 and +2 degrees climate the potential overnight stays are projected to increase in average in almost the entire European domain, except Cyprus which exhibits a consistent decrease, robust across all scenarios. In contrast, for the peak of the summer season between June and August, it is projected that the European south will potentially exhibit decrease in the overnight stays to as high as 20% and for some cases to even higher than 30% (Greece). Key strength of the results are the correlation of measured tourism indicators to a conceptual index, which gives the ability to quantify the change in the tourism indicator, rather than investigating the coarser concept of climate risk.

Health care in remote areas.

PubMed

Padeken, D; Sotiriou, D; Boddy, K; Gerzer, R

1995-02-01

Migration from space medicine toward telemedicine services is described by potential application areas in highly populated and remote areas of Europe. Special emphasis is laid upon links between mobile patient monitoring and health care in remote areas. Pilot projects are described for home (mobile) monitoring of newborn infants endangered by sudden infant death (SID) and adults suffering from sleep apnoea. Health care in remote areas is described by the "TeleClinic-project" which will link national nodes for telemedicine services in several European states for the mobile European citizen. Another project describes the future potential of robotics for semiautonomous ultrasound diagnostics and for realtime interaction of remote experts with diagnostics and therapy.