Monthly Newsletter of the Advanced Light Source, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
A New Universal Parameter for Superconductivity
Scientists have been researching high-temperature (high-Tc) superconductors for decades with the goal of finding materials that express superconducting capabilities at room temperature, which would be a requirement for practical and cost-effective applications. The newest materials to gain scientific interest are iron-based superconductors, and the latest research from the ALS on these materials indicates a new factor that determines their superconductivity. Read more…
Researchers have published a landmark study that used both crystallography and SAXS to validate computationally designed structures of novel proteins with repeated motifs. The results show that the protein-folding universe is far larger than realized, opening up a wide array of new possibilities for biomolecular engineering. Read more…
Protein crystallography at ALS Beamline 8.3.1 helped scientists understand the M2 proton-channel structure from the influenza A virus, an understanding that is needed to design better anti-influenza medications. Read more…
On the Way to Unlimited Energy
With the help of four different ALS beamlines, scientists were able to understand and improve the morphology of the main device structure in organic photovoltaic cells. Read more…
Superlattices Patterned by Polymers
Scientists have shown that self-assembled superlattices, made up of nanoparticles with polymer chains grafted onto their surfaces (“hairy nanoparticles,” or polymer “brushes”), can be tailored to exhibit desired characteristics for applications ranging from nano- to biotechnology. Read more…
Missing Oxygen Atoms Are Key to Robust Spintronic Material
Researchers studied In2O3:Fe, a promising spintronic material, to determine what leads to its surprisingly robust magnetic properties, how to optimize it, and what to look for in other candidate spintronics materials. Read more…
ALS Surpasses 10,000 Publications
ALS research has now been featured in more than 10,000 refereed journal articles. The 10,000th publication was submitted to the ALS publications database earlier this year and featured work from Beamlines 4.0.2 and 6.3.1. The article, titled “Electronic and magnetic phenomena at the interface of LaAlO3 and Ru doped SrTiO3,” was published in Applied Physics Letters and was co-authored by Matt Gray, Ted Sanders, and Yuri Suzuki from Stanford University, and Catherine Jenkins, Padraic Shafer, and Elke Arenholz from the ALS. ALS users are reminded that all publications resulting from work done in whole, or in part, at the ALS must acknowledge the ALS and DOE and must be reported to the ALS User Office according to specific guidelines.
Ringleader: Jay Nix, Beamline Director for the Molecular Biology Consortium
Jay Nix started the user program at Beamline 4.2.2 back in 2004, shortly after the Molecular Biology Consortium built the beamline. The macromolecular crystallography beamline is a little different than most at the ALS because it’s privately managed by a consortium of ten Midwest universities that pooled their money together to build the beamline, and now continue to do so to maintain it, with the help of Nix. Read more…
UEC Corner: Updates from the April Meeting
Preparations for the 2016 ALS User Meeting on October 3-5 are well underway. The meeting will feature an exciting program with plenary talks, workshops, and invited speakers showing cutting-edge science enabled by high-brightness storage rings.
The UEC members, as representatives of the ALS user community, rely on feedback from the community. To gather feedback from the user community, in June the UEC will start hosting a user forum on their UEC meeting days. The first user forum date will be announced shortly. Cookies and coffee will be served.
The 2016 UEC, left to right: Andreas Scholl (ESG/LBNL), David Shuh (CSD/LBNL), Tyler Troy (CSD/LBNL), Brian Collins (WSU), Mike Makowski (UCI), Fanny Rodolakis (ANL), and Robert Streubel (MSD/LBNL). Not pictured: Lin Wang (HPSTAR), Alessandro Sepe (Cambridge), Monika Blum (UNLV), Will Chueh (Stanford), Micky Holcomb (WVU), and Tanja Cuk (UCB).
New Staff Provide User Support
Mike Brady, Joint ALS/Molecular Foundry Project Scientist
Mike Brady was recently appointed by the ALS and the Molecular Foundry to the role of joint ALS/Foundry project scientist. Brady will focus on fostering collaborations between the two facilities’ users, identifying new scientific directions for collaborative research, and communicating a wider understanding about how the two research centers are mutually scientifically complementary through networking and recruitment efforts. Previously a materials science postdoc at the ALS, Brady is particularly interested in the correlation of the chemistry of polymers with the analysis of polymer structure and performance, and he will pursue active research in this direction.
Andrea Jones, ALS Proposal Administrator
The ALS User Services Office has a new proposal administrator, Andrea Jones, who will be facilitating the proposal review process. If users have any questions about the proposal submission or review processes, she’ll be the person to turn to. Jones holds a PhD in biological anthropology and has been teaching as an adjunct faculty member at Berkeley City College for the past nine years. Jones will be at the ALS part-time until the end of May, and full-time thereafter. Stop by the User Office to say hello!
Operations Update
For the user runs from February 18 to March 22, 2016, the beam reliability [(time scheduled – time lost)/time scheduled)] was 98.5%. For this period, the mean time between failures (MTBF) was 72.6 hours, and the mean time to recovery (MTTR) was 83 minutes. There were no significant interruptions.
Detailed information on reliability is available on the ALS reliability bulletin board, which is located in the hallway between the ALS and the control room in Building 80. Questions about beam reliability should be directed to Dave Richardson (DBRichardson@lbl.gov, x4376).
ALS in the News
