EUCALL will build bridges between major laser and X-ray research centres
For the past half-century, two special kinds of light have changed the landscape of research. Advanced visible-spectrum optical lasers have propelled studies into ultrafast processes, new materials, telecommunications, and many other fields, while intense X-rays produced at synchrotrons have helped image tiny structures and otherwise invisible parts of matter, enabling huge leaps in biochemistry, pharmacology, and materials science. In recent years, new developments have enhanced the generation of X-rays at large-scale optical laser and accelerator facilities, requiring large international research centres. The European Union is now funding a 7 million-euro effort to bring these research centres together through the European Cluster of Advanced Laser Light Sources (EUCALL) project. The project will be managed by European XFEL, an X-ray free-electron laser currently under construction in the Hamburg area of Germany.
Within the EUCALL project, the two types of large-scale X-ray RIs in Europe collaborate for the first time in a comprehensive way on technical, scientific, and strategic issues. One of the project’s main goals is to make substantial scientific and technological contributions through new synergies between laser-driven and accelerator-driven X-ray RIs. Under EUCALL, the RIs can work together on common methodologies and research opportunities, potentially sparking new scientific investigations, as well as new applications and private sector innovation, and develop tools to sustain this interaction in the future. The project will allow the involved RIs to provide scientists from around the world better access to highly sought-out X-ray facilities.
To accomplish these goals, the EUCALL partners will work together on strategic and technological developments that can be used at all facilities, along with better protocols to enable scientists to make the best possible use of limited experiment time.
Three major international RIs have a key role in EUCALL: European XFEL, a 3.4 km-long X-ray free-electron laser that will open in 2017 and use ultrabright X-ray laser flashes to investigate nanoscale particles, ultrafast processes, and extreme states of matter; the Extreme Light Infrastructure (ELI), a trio of cutting-edge high-power optical laser laboratories in the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Romania that will become operational in 2018; and the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) in Grenoble, France, which is one of the most prominent X-ray research centres in the world.
The ELI Beamlines facility in the Czech republic will provide ultra-short laser pulses of a few femtoseconds (10-15 fs) duration and give performance up to 10 PW. There will be accomplished and implemented research projects covering the interaction of light with matter at intensity being 10 times higher than currently achievable values. This laser facility will bring new techniques for medical image-display and diagnostics, radiotherapy, tools for new materials developing and testing, latest in X-ray optics, etc. It will also be an attractive platform for educating a new generation of PhD. students, scientists and engineers. The Czech Republic will become the host country for the top international research, which may attract further investment in advanced technologies with high added value.
ELI Beamlines will provide four laser systems for multidisciplinary applications. They will be able to deliver high-quality sources of various kinds adapted to the needs of a large variety of users.
All of these RIs have their foundations in broad experience developed at a large number of optical laser- and accelerator-based X-ray laboratories. Therefore, EUCALL also includes the existing EU collaborations of these facilities, LASERLAB-Europe and FELs of Europe, as well as three partners that work closely with ELI.“EUCALL enables optical laser- and accelerator-based X-ray facilities in Europe to develop common strategies and new technologies to help our scientific users engage even more research possibilities”, says European XFEL Scientific Director Thomas Tschentscher, who will act as EUCALL project coordinator. “Their implementation will help to maintain a leading role for European research in many critical areas.”
“Coinciding with the International Year of Light, EUCALL is the first serious effort to bring together scientific communities who have been using X-ray light in parallel to each other, and from different scientific and technological backgrounds”, says ELI Director-General Wolfgang Sandner. “ELI highly welcomes the increased research opportunities and innovation potential that will arise from this synergy, to the benefit of its European and international users.”
